Boko Haram can be defeated

Yesterday, the insurgents attempted to take over Damaturu, the Yobe State capital, after ransacking the state university campus, and setting off two bombs in a market in Maiduguri. They seem to strike at will, while our government increasingly appears hapless. But, strange as it may sound right now, last Friday’s repulsive and cowardly attacks on […]

Yesterday, the insurgents attempted to take over Damaturu, the Yobe State capital, after ransacking the state university campus, and setting off two bombs in a market in Maiduguri. They seem to strike at will, while our government increasingly appears hapless. But, strange as it may sound right now, last Friday’s repulsive and cowardly attacks on worshipers at Kano Central Mosque, strikes me as a clear sign that it can be defeated. It may offer little or no consolation to those who are dead, wounded or have lost loved ones, and may indeed not be sufficient to strengthen the hearts of our citizens already traumatized by the seemingly endless atrocities of this rampaging band of barbarians brutally trying to enforce their own brand of ‘Islam’ while our government seems preoccupied with 2015 campaigns. Yet these attacks appear to me as acts of desperation. Such acts of desperation could indicate serious fears and vulnerabilities. These can actually be exploited to end the insurgency.
Abubakar Shekau (and we assume that he is indeed alive) and his gang seem to randomly select targets. However, there is a method to their madness. There are at least five groups of targets reflecting five sets of objectives. The first is government buildings and security agencies targeted to delegitimize the state and its institutions. These are prisons, police outposts and stations, military barracks, and even the (Police) Force Headquarters. The aim is to show the state as too weak to defend itself, or stand up to the insurgents. The second group consists of churches, motor parks and even busses (especially ferrying passengers to the South) to sow divisions with the hope of sparking religious hatred, ethnic conflicts, and perhaps even the break-up of the country. They are not foolish enough to assume they can impose their version of Islam on the whole of Nigeria, so if they can split it they probably believe that would make their job easier. The third group of targets are the soft ones – markets, shopping complexes, ATMs, small towns and villages – to terrorise the people and convince them that no government can protect them, and thus it if futile to resist. They abduct boys, kill adult males, and whisk away the girls (into forced marriage or worse) and generally instil fear into everyone even before they arrive. Schools, colleges and universities make up the forth, and no less important, group even if to underline their opposition to Western education.
But Boko Haram seems to reserve special “treatment” for individuals, groups (like the civilian JTFs) or towns and villages that stand up to challenge them, especially those that seek to question their “Islamic” credentials or their claim to be doing “Allah’s work”. The specific targeting of Islamic scholars, religious and traditional leaders along with political figures that speak out against them (especially from the North) is no accident. Their murderous enterprise is supposedly to set up an Islamic State, so they are very sensitive to being challenged on that basis. Strange as it may seem, and risky as it obviously is, this is where our hope lies. It is only when the vast majority of us who do not believe in their convoluted desecration of our peaceful religion decide to speak out, and stand up to them, that this insurgency can be ended. Which explains the especially murderous intents they had for Kano where, but for divine intervention, the casualties could have been in the thousands. Kano had said no to them, and our leaders have called on people to stand up in self-defence. These are our “crimes” apparently.
It is important to remind ourselves what insurgencies and counterinsurgencies are. An “insurgency”, according to the U. S. Department of the Army, Field Manual 3-24, “is an organized, protracted politico-military struggle designed to weaken the control and legitimacy of an established government, occupying power, or other political authority while increasing insurgent control…Insurgents use all available tools—political (including diplomatic),informational (including appeals to religious, ethnic, or ideological beliefs), military, and economic—to overthrow the existing authority.” Counterinsurgency is therefore, “those military, paramilitary, political, economic, psychological, and civic actions taken by a government to defeat an insurgency”  utilizing all available instruments of national power “in order to sustain an existing or emerging legitimate authority”. Fighting Boko Haram therefore must involve all individuals, agencies, institutions and groups in society that are opposed to it, whether or not they support the government of the day, provided they do not accept the aims, objectives and methods of the insurgents.
Military scholars list six prerequisites for a successful insurgency. These are (1) a cause to fight for; (2) local populace support; (3) weakness in the authority; (4) geographic conditions; (5) external support; and (6) information advantage. Those hoping to fight insurgents successfully must therefore seek to deny them these. It is easy to see the importance of ensuring they do not gain local popular support, and of denying them access to finance, logistical and other assistance from say Cameroon, Chad, Niger Republic and elsewhere. That the terrain must also be fully understood and captured in any counterinsurgency is also easy to comprehend. The biggest obstacle, in our case, is accepting the negative contribution of weak political resolve and institutional fragility. The biggest hindrance, and one which hinders any collective resolve or capability to fight, is when corruption, administrative incompetence or political intrigues and divisions eat into the system. When the powers that be refuse to see those who disagree politically with them as potential partners in the fight against terror, then we have a problem.
Ultimately it is the first and the last prerequisites that may get us out of the cul-de-sac we are lost in. We must prove better in using information technology so as to expose  BH murderous and barbaric practices in all the places it had captured. We must continue to denounce the killing, maiming and abduction of our girls, who have done them no wrong whatsoever. They will lose this war, not because our leaders are competent or clean, not because they even know what they should be doing, but because we must rise above their petty politics, corrupt inducements and ludicrous lies. No matter how long it takes, Boko Haram will lose because it is on the wrong path. Only when it is sufficiently weakened would it be forced to negotiate. Not before then. Those who have been so blinded by their greed to remain in power that they could not pay enough attention to the scourge of Boko Haram may find themselves replaced by those sufficiently concerned by its’ threats, and who succeed in assuring Nigerians that they can end the mayhem and bloodshed.