Countering violent extremism narratives

To many of us regular people what on earth could be the reason why some people would choose to become violent extremists even at the cost of their lives? It’s really not inexplicable with ordinary language. I can only imagine that a whole lot of factors come into play in influencing such people to make […]

To many of us regular people what on earth could be the reason why some people would choose to become violent extremists even at the cost of their lives? It’s really not inexplicable with ordinary language. I can only imagine that a whole lot of factors come into play in influencing such people to make up their minds to become suicide bombers and engage in violent extremism. We have heard of how Europeans get recruited on-line and even spend their money to join ISIS. To many of us, that is incredible.
What are they usually told that would be so convincing to wanting to undertake such risk? We are yet to arrive at a consensus on the motivation behind such endeavors. The scenario is a little different in Nigeria. We have not started observing online radicalization but we are aware that they get members regularly. How they get radicalized, recruited and established is a major concern for us in the research world. I believe that the best counterterrorism strategy will be to cut off the supply chain of recruits while the military continue to degrade the existing capabilities of the sect.
In order to cut off the supply chain, we must be able to understand the narratives and messaging format for recruiting members. Our understanding of the narrative will help us to build, convey, and publicize a comprehensive counter-narrative to violent extremism. It requires international cooperation between the United Nations, governmental bodies, and serious experts on the subject matter. It also requires comprehensiveness, credibility, and wide accessibility. A comprehensive counter-narrative should be able to cover the major dimensions of the violent extremist ontology in question, namely the political, historical, socio-psychological, theological, and instrumental dimensions.
It also has to be conveyed, promoted, and supported by credible messengers. Since the 1960s, empirical data have consistently shown that sophisticated counterarguments to the ideologies of violent extremists without conveyance by credible messengers can have only limited success.
Putting a total end to the threats of Boko Haram in Nigeria is the compelling challenge the federal government faces today. This explains why huge resources have been devoted towards prosecuting this operation with the optimism that it will destroy Boko Haram. Even when it is obvious that the group have been degraded, we still hear reports of staggered cases of suicide bombings across the northeast indicating that they are equally struggling to maintain their operational presence and control the messages.
There is no doubt that the Nigerian armed forces have seriously degraded the capabilities of the group, dispersed them into hiding but within the population. It is only occasionally, that the group sneak out of their hiding places within the larger population just create surprise attacks that throws everyone into confusion. The results so far obtained from Nigerian military action engagement could be described as adequate given that the AFN was not traditionally trained for this kind of warfare.
The stage where Nigeria is in the fight against Boko Haram terrorism is what is referred to as the rebuilding stage. It means recreating the communities already destroyed and building community resilience against Boko Haram. This stage involve effective utilization of soft power approach. This approach is considered to be the crux of counterterrorism because it deals with the root cause.
Aside from helping the communities to restart their lives and take control of it, the approach also examines the drivers and enablers of violent extremism with a view to creating counter narratives and messages against violent extremism. The importance of this aspect of the soft power approach is to cut-off the recruitment supply chain. This stage requires a lot of empirical research which will help policy makers to initiate strategies and programs that will counter the narratives and messages of terrorists.
This is largely because the policies have not been based on evidenced-based research. This may not be far from the truth because the available research on Boko Haram in Nigeria especially those from local scholars lack empirical research basis. Most of the research on Boko Haram are event-driven and reactionary. Most times the major actors in the policy domain do not consult the researcher on what the issues are about.
Most times, researchers do not have access to detention facilities in order to interview members under government custody. Even operational officers at the theatre of operations decline commenting on the issue when consulted for fear of being misquoted. Indeed there is a gap between policy and research in the fight against Boko Haram in Nigeria. We need to change these narratives.
Mamud wrote in from Abuja.