The leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) committed a blunder with its statement about the possibility of President Goodluck Jonathan presenting a fake leader of Boko Haram, Abubakar Shekau, as proof that Nigeria has won the war against the militant Islamic group. It does not make any sense at all. It is as if they are happy the scourge is continuing instead of abating. What is the business of APC raising the alarm about a false Shekau? Do they have links to the ‘real’ one? The media managers of APC need to check themselves, unless of course their leadership knows something the rest of Nigeria does not know.
Jonathan and his handlers have proclaimed the death of Shekau several times. The APC should have left it at that. We can only know Shekau is dead when the mad man does not make a fresh broadcast again. We can also know through a reduction in the group’s activities. So, APC goofed badly on that score. Right now, what one expects of the APC leadership is to go ahead of Jonathan in using formal and informal media to fight against Boko Haram. Jonathan has proved beyond reasonable doubt that with the enormous resources at his disposal, he is incapable of containing the scourge that is Boko Haram. APC is not in control of the country, thus, its armed forces yet. What the party has as its most potent weapon is a man considered by the Northern grassroots as their own Obafemi Awolowo.
Whether anyone likes it or not, it appears the leadership of Boko Haram respects Buhari. The only good thing that should have come out of that is for the retired General to regularly come out and speak against the evil deeds of the group. Apart from demoralizing Boko Haram’s leadership, it will also reduce their power of recruitment. Young men and women, who naively believe they are getting involved in a genuine Jihad will have a rethink and stop going over to the murderous group. That should have been Buhari’s major assignment on a weekly basis till this election is over. Sadly, we have not seen any of that.
Some of us would not have supported Buhari, if Jonathan had done the needful about the menace of Boko Haram more than two years ago. From denial to pretense and an attitude that bothers on culpability, Jonathan from one misstep to another has been presenting a picture of someone who should never have occupied the seat of Nigeria’s number one citizen. Of course many are shouting from the rooftops today that it is the new equipment bought for the military that appears to be rolling back the nefarious activities of Boko Haram. These are people living in self-denial or persons without a deep knowledge of security issues, who could be easily misled by the primary school explanations being given by Jonathan’s handlers.
The first rule in guerrilla warfare for any serious government is to cut the supply route of the militants. Biafra would have lasted more if the late sage, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, had not advised concerning the needful. Food and arms supply along with the routes of doing such should have been tackled long ago by our clueless president. No matter the amount of food and arms in the possession of a guerilla group, it is on a daily basis they use it up. Besides, they hardly stay in a location for too long. Thus, it is very easy to track and cut off their supply routes without firing a single shot. Why have we not been able to do this till date?
It is very doubtful Boko Haram gets its arms and food supply through any of the sea ports in Lagos or Port Harcourt. The easiest and most obvious points for supplying these items to the militants remain our Northern neighbours. And one cannot blame them much – their economy is weak, and they have weak armed forces too. As long as Boko Haram is not disturbing them, why bother with the illicit traffic of arms and food to Nigeria? It is also not impossible that there are sympathizers of Boko Haram in the topmost hierarchy of both Niger and Chad, to the extent that these persons believe they are doing the group a favour by allowing ‘Islam’ to make further inroads into a country with a nominal Muslim majority, which in actual fact has more Christians than Muslims. Only a Nigerian president with a no-nonsense attitude can send a clear signal to these neighbours that their countries would suffer if they allow Boko Haram passage through their land.
Closing our borders with Niger, Chad and Cameroon would have been an effective check against the influx of weapons and food supply among other logistics to the satanic group. Once supply routes are blocked, you can accurately predict, with up to 80% assurance, when Boko Haram or any other group like that, should be rendered incapable of launching attacks on our soil. There is even the option of complete state of emergency. Jonathan for once never exploited this. If Borno State had been put in a total state of emergency with a Military Administrator in charge, it would have checked the spread of the terror group’s activities. Instead what we had was a slap on the wrist kind of emergency, where politicians who inspired and gave life to Boko Haram still had and are still having a free day. In the process, lives and properties continued to be lost on a horrendous scale with the president of a country that should be the most powerful in Africa wringing his hands in a grand display of cluelessness. Pray, what has the governors of the three affected states been using their allocations for? Who have they been governing?
Psychological warfare (Psy Ops) is also a major ingredient in the arsenal of the American military - not nuclear weapons. Subtle interference, using the media (formal and informal), churches, NGOs, mosques and the likes have greatly assisted the United States to weaken rogues states and others they consider as enemies. ‘Crusades’ in the name of evangelism have been encouraged in different parts of the world along with a generous dosage of ‘democratic process’ seminars in Washington for key political actors from a lot of countries without these persons and groups realizing they were being induced to think the American way and indirectly do the biddings of the United States. Not a single shot fired. No bullet wasted. Such persons go back to their countries to either foment trouble or stay calm to support oppressive regimes favourable to the Americans in the name of not going against the ‘Will of God’ by looking the other way when such persons pillage the treasury as Mobutu Sese Seko did in Congo. Active opposition by way of arms struggle or street protests is discouraged. How many Psy-Ops have the Jonathan Administration commissioned against Boko Haram - either from our military or the SSS? And it is not just to push Boko Haram back. In the communities affected by Boko Haram, without a well-planned system of Psychological re-orientation, things may never be the same for them in the next 50 years. So, Jonathan also failed on the Mass Communication front.
But the biggest blunder today has been committed by the APC. The talk about fake or genuine Shekau should stop. If the APC really feels it is concerned about the Boko Haram scourge, the best thing to do is for Buhari to use his influence to go against them in a moral manner. A guerilla group without local support is as good as dead. Buhari has what it takes to render Boko Haram impotent, morally, across its area of operation. The man commands enormous respect across the North, especially among the lower classes and the Islamically inclined. It is not enough to commend the military. Let the change begin from a man we want to become president proclaiming from the rooftops the evil that Boko Haram represents.
Wale Adedayo is an accomplished journalist cum politician. He is the publisher/editor-in-chief of Uhuru Times, an online news website. +Wale Adedayo @waleadedayo on twitter
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