Opinion: Does Nigeria risk being next Iraq? The leadership of Boko Haram must think they have hit the jackpot. The abduction of more than 200 school girls in the northeast Nigeria has been denounced by U.S President Barack Obama and UK Prime Minister David Cameron. That has given them all the publicity they crave. Their movement is now the top item on all global news channels. If, as I suspect, Boko Haram sees itself as a suicide mission to inspire all Muslims to follow them and wage war on the West, they must feel their hour has come. The final battle is about to begin. Borno state is one of the poorest, most neglected parts of the planet. Until recently I would have said the only surplus in that part of Nigeria was its long-suffering Islamic resignation. Now that has turned to anger. And this remote, dry, dusty corner of Nigeria, a place you would only visit on your way to the Sahara Desert, has become the new battleground between militant Islam and the Western world. How? The answer lies in a very telling comment from John Kerry, the U.S Secretary of State. The U.S had, he said repeatedly offered help to Nigeria but it was ignored. Ignored. That is exactly what the Nigeria govts attitude has been to the northeast for decades-- and to the Boko Haram terrorists until they hit Abuja, the capital. Then there was an attempt to clamp down but the security extended there never reached Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state in the northeast and some 500miles away from Abuja, the capital and another 320miles from Lagos, the commercial megacity of West Africa. So it doesnt matter. Just as the kidnapping of more than 200girls did not elicit any statement from President Goodluck Jonathan until more than two weeks after it happened. Nor do the levels of poverty, unemployment, lack of education and health services and a fast growing population in the northeast matter to the govt. Its income derives from Westen oil companies so the govt has little democratic relationship with the people of Nigeria. 60% live in poverty. Boko Haram began as a fundamentalist but not particularly violent movement in 2002. The killing of its leader, Mohammed Yusuf, while in police custody inspired it members to take up arms against the state. Nigerian police said Yusuf had been shot while trying to escape, but other reports said he had been summarily executed. The police force, which in normal times just collects personal fines from motorists and others for minor transgressions, is too corrupt to protect anyone. Meanwhile the army, trained to fight a conventional war, went in heavily and terrified rather than protected the population. May9, last year Boko Haram attacked a barrack, a prison and police post in the town of Bama. The millitary said the group killed 55 people and freed 105 prisoners. Nigeria is used to uprising. A few years ago the Niger Delta which produces Nigerias immense oil wealth, was in flames. Gangs of youths with heavy machine guns killed their rivals amd kidnapped oil workers for cash. They too played on the neglect of local population which could see billions of dollars- worth of oil being sucked out from under their feet while not a single road was being built. The govt of Goodluck Jonathan- himself from the Delta- now administers program under which former militants receive payments to give up their arms. Many of the militants were given jobs in the govt and swapped the T-shirts and bandanas for sharp suits and ties. But there is no such incentive to develop Borno state. It produces nothing and will not vote for President Jonathan. Unless there is a major political upset, he will serve another 4 year term after elections in February next year. The big challenge in Nigeria for the U.S military and intelligence services is this: if they limit their intervention purely to tracking down and releasing the girls and killing or capturing the Boko Haram kidnappers, they will have a brief success followed by a long term failure. No movement like Boko Haram can exist for long without some, at least tacit, support of the local people. And the local people have little to thank the goct for. The Navy Seals of U.S stormed ashore Mogadishu in 1992 followed by waves of Marines. For a few weeks Somalia was quite peaceful, mission accomplished was the message. Positive stories were written about the restoration of Somalia. The war has continued to this day. Two years later, the U.S Marines went into Kuwait and then into Iraq in the first Gulf war. Problem solved, it seemed, that very attitude simply strengthened them. Have the lessons from Iraq, Afghanistan etc been learned? Military intervention is tough but easy compared with long haul of development which must accompany it. The Kanuri people of northeast Nigeria need robust protection, peace and security in the short term but they also need education, health services and livelihoods in the long term. To be continued....
Posted on: Tue, 03 Jun 2014 06:44:17 +0000
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