Resurging insurgency in the North East and some of the challenges

The insurgency in the northeast of the country is estimated to have consumed the lives of more than 30,000 individuals and displaced millions from their homes since its outbreak in 2009. The group’s strength, thought to be degraded, seems to have suddenly gotten resuscitated. The execution of more than 50 innocent people, combined, in parts […]

The insurgency in the northeast of the country is estimated to have consumed the lives of more than 30,000 individuals and displaced millions from their homes since its outbreak in 2009.

The group’s strength, thought to be degraded, seems to have suddenly gotten resuscitated. The execution of more than 50 innocent people, combined, in parts of Kukawa, Baga, Gwoza, Chibok and Damboa local government areas of Borno state is a chilling reminder of the worst of the heydays of the Boko Haram (Jama’at Ahl as-Sunnah lid-Da’wah wa’l-Jihad) insurgency in the Lake Chad region of Nigeria, and indeed, Cameroon, Chad and Niger republics. It creates a feeling of dejavu.

The new development is a grim reality that the insurgency is still alive and potent after more than one and a half decades, this time under its more organised progeny, the Islamic State in the West Africa Province (ISWAP). The two mutually antagonist entities (ISWAP/Boko Haram) seemed to have renewed their carnage by mounting ceaseless attacks on settlements in Kirawa, Pulka, and even Gwoza township.

Also, not spared, were the Southern Borno villages of Bamzir, Njilang, Sabon Gari, Shikarkir, Kauji, Whuntaku, Mbalala, Pemi, Wajirko, and many more, in Chibok, and Damboa LGAs, where residents and places of worship were raised down. Even the military was not spared, as over half a dozen paid the supreme price during their recent encounters with the insurgents.

The upsurge in violent activities in Borno State, the birthplace and epicentre of Boko Haram, is coming after years of lull; a lull that made the then Chief of Army Staff to declare that the insurgency had been “technically defeated.” The optimism, however, now seems to be premature and misplaced. Maybe the short interregnum of peace may not be entirely on account of the military campaigns but rather due to the internal wrangling that ensued between the main Boko Haram and its offshoot, ISWAP.

The insurgents have equally increased their activities in other parts of Borno and Yobe such as Geidam, Dapchi, Gorgore, Talala, Buni-Yadi etc with a high potential for a spillover into contiguous states of Adamawa, Gombe and Bauchi. As it were, the Sambisa Forest, which serves as a safe haven for the insurgents/terrorists, stretching across some of these states right from the Chad basin region. The forest provides a corridor from Borno, through Yobe, to Gombe before linking the Yankari Game Reserve in Bauchi State.

The ISWAP’s new campaign was to cut Southern Borno from the North. Ditto with Yobe. So far, the insurgents have succeeded in cutting off Biu to Maiduguri road via Damboa. They have been threatening the Gwoza-Maiduguri highway with reasonable success. The Damaturu-Biu, road connecting Southern Yobe and Borno, has remained under constant threats. The high-profile abductions along the highway, which included a chief judge and a retired engineer, attest to this.

The remnants of the Boko Haram have been busy bringing down public infrastructure like power lines (towers), healthcare centres, and schools in rural Borno and Yobe states.

The need for a change of approach from containment to dislodgement cannot be overstated. The military should go on the full offensive. ISWAP/BK operations are no longer clandestine. They move in an open and military fashion. The issue of waiting for “cooperation,” “credible information,” and “actionable intelligence” may no longer be convincing. They are there for all to see! They are bold, daring and visible.

The military campaigns should include opening up the insurgency enclaves in Borno, especially its cells in Gwoza, Chibok, Damboa and Katarko (Gujba), in Yobe. This could be done by opening the Maiduguri-Damboa-Biu highway that traverses the entire Southern region of the state.

The illegal supply routes in northern parts of Borno and Yobe should be cut off too, to deny the insurgents free access to arms and ammunition. A motorable infrastructure put around the affected areas can go a long way in this regard. After all, experts believe that communication, mobility, troops morale, firepower, infrastructure (roads), etc, are critical success factors (CSFs) in war; conventional or guerrilla.

Keeping the highway open shall deny the insurgents the needed incubation centres. The feeling of invincibility they now have will also evaporate. Leaving the zone for them is sending the wrong message of helplessness on the part of the national government. Imagine, if during the heydays of Boko Haram, the group had succeeded in cutting Borno/Yobe from the westward link with Kano, the nation would have been left with a “caliphate” next door. Keeping the Maiduguri-Kano road at all costs saved the grim possibility.

ISWAP currently runs a well-structured administrative system in the Lake Chad basin made up of an executive council called “Shura” which oversights affairs across five or so governerates/states. One operates a legal system with a chief justice that runs on shari’a and also a financial setup that includes taxation over more than a million people living under its spheres of influence.

For defence, ISWAP has an armoury stocked by procured and captured weapons/equipment. This is in addition to a drone (though primitive) technology centre and a cadet training “school” for preparing future fighters that translates as khalifa cadet school. It is patterned along Islamic State’s Cubs of the Caliphate.

Taking the war to ISWAP/Boko Haram doorsteps appears now the much-needed alternative. Nigeria can borrow a leaf from the experiences of Colombia with FARC, Sri Lanka with the Tamil Tigers, the Philippines with Abu Sayyaf Group, and Indonesia in addressing the Jemaa Islam, JI, movements.

The longer ISWAP/Boko Haram lingers, the more malignant the movement becomes. Already it is believed that ISWAP has a latent but fast crystalising presence in parts of Kwara, Oyo, Osun and Niger states. Nigeria has the capacity to rein them in. It’s a question of willpower and taming corruption.

 

Abubakar resides at , House No. M13, Commissioner Road, Unguwan Dosa, Kaduna. Email; [email protected]