These,
without a doubt, are strange times for Nigeria. To say that the spate
of insecurity in the country is becoming very alarming will be an
understatement. Suddenly, we are faced with a different kind of
insecurity occasioned by incessant terrorist activities.
Before
now, terrorism is alien to our culture. But occurrences in recent years
have since altered the picture as the reprehensible activities of the
Boko Haram sect, which today remains one of the nation’s foremost
adversaries, have made Nigeria a focal point of global terrorism
activities. Through a series of bloodletting operations, unrivalled in
the annals of the country, the sect has, in the past 12 years, held the
nation to ransom.
To underline its newly found status as a
global terrorist group, the sect was designated by the US Department of
State as a terrorist organisation in 2013. In the first half of 2014, it
killed more than 2,000 innocent and hapless civilians, in about 95
attacks. In the last three years, more than 3,000, people have lost
their lives as a result of Boko Haram terrorist operations. A recent
data claimed that Boko Haram attacks have left at least 12,000 people
dead and 8,000 crippled in the last three years while hundreds of
thousands have fled their homes for the fear of the insurgents.
Perhaps,
the most audacious of the dastardly acts of the group, till date,
remains the abduction of over 200 secondary school girls, who were
kidnapped in a most notorious manner, from their dormitories in
Government College Chibok, Borno State. The girls, henceforth to be
referred to as our girls, have since been in the custody of the sect for
well over 140 days. The act was met with outrage and wide condemnations
across the world.
Indeed,
some of the leading nations of the world offered to help in rescuing
our girls. Several local and international groups have equally been
clamouring for the release of our girls. A renowned 17-year-old Pakistan
child right activist, Malala, recently visited the country on account
of our girls’ plight. She reportedly had “useful” discussions with major
stakeholders including President Goodluck Jonathan. Malala’s visit
eventually opened the door for a Presidential parley between the
Presidency and distraught parents of our girls. The parley was, however,
beclouded by controversies over the sharing formula for the money
purportedly released by the Presidency for the upkeep of our girls’
parents.
Somewhere along the line, we were told by the nation’s
military high command that the location of our girls, supposedly in a
vast forest named Sambisa along the Nigerian /Cameroonian border by
Eastern Borno, had been discovered . However, according to military
authorities, they had to tread cautiously in order not to jeopardise the
safety of our girls. Good. But, while one appreciates the efforts of
all the stakeholders in the bid to free our girls, the point, however,
is that we are now becoming very apprehensive, especially with regard to
the safety of our girls.
With
Ebola presently capturing the attention of the whole nation coupled
with preparations for the 2015 general elections, the fear is that, like
most unresolved murder cases in the country, the issue of our girls
might soon fizzle out of the consciousness of the nation. Consequently,
more than ever before, this is the time to keep asking questions
concerning the plight of our girls. Where are our girls? What is
happening to them? How are they being fed? With what are they being fed?
How healthy is the place where they are being kept? Are they being
sexually abused by their captors? Is it true that they have been fully
integrated into the Boko Haram family? Is it true that some of them are
now being used as suicide bombers? How can we be pretending that all is
well when we have yet to find our girls? Are we actually making efforts
to bring back our girls?
This brings us to the issue of the
Nigerian military. Truth be told, these are unusual times for our
military. Perhaps, there is no other time in the country’s history,
aside from the civil war era, when the professionalism of the Nigerian
military has been fiercely put to test than now. While one values the
sacrifices of our military men and women who put their lives at risk to
uphold the safety of other members of the society, one must, however,
stress that the Nigerian military needs to do more than it is presently
doing in order to completely flush out the men who have held our nation
hostage for too long.
One
is rather disturbed by several unconfirmed reports of Nigerian soldiers
absconding to neighbourng Cameroon in a bid to escape the ferocious
firing power of Boko Haram insurgents. Though one is not really schooled
in the art of military warfare, it is becoming alarming that we
couldn’t really curtail Boko Haram’s incursion through military actions
thus far. Some have suggested, though one finds this rather incredible,
that the insurgents possess more sophisticated war arsenals than the
Nigerian military. Could our military have really sunk that low?
In
his inaugural speech in May 29, 1999, former President Olusegun
Obasanjo painted a rather horrid picture of the Nigerian Army when he
said among others that “the incursion of the military into government
has been a disaster for our country and for the military over the last
thirty years. The esprit-de-corps amongst military personnel has been
destroyed; professionalism has been lost. Youths go into the military
not to pursue a noble career but with the sole intention of taking part
in coups and to be appointed as military administrators of states and
chairmen of task forces”.
Obasanjo further affirmed that “as a
retired officer, my heart bleeds to see the degradation in the
proficiency of the military. A great deal of reorientation has to be
undertaken and a re-definition of roles, retraining and re-education
will have to be done to ensure that the military submits to civil
authority and regains its pride, professionalism and traditions. We
shall restore military cooperation and exchanges with our traditional
friends. And we will help the military to help itself”.
To what
extent the fortune of the military has improved in the last fourteen
years of democratic rule is better left for scholars, researchers and
other stakeholders to determine. One thing that is, however, certain is
that these are tough times for our military. But with the help of
everyone stakeholder in the country, we shall surely overcome.
We
have demonstrated with our commitment to the containment of the deadly
Ebola virus that we can fight back when we are pushed to the wall. We
need to do more in our resistance against our other adversaries. God
bless Nigeria!
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