BOKO HARAM: Candy and pizza for Nigeria’s TERRORISTS

WHEN Senator Ibrahim Geidam introduced the bill seeking to establish ‘National Agency for the Education, Rehabilitation and De-radicalisation of Repentant Insurgents in Nigeria,’ perhaps, little did he know that he was going to stir the hornet’s nest.

With recent development in the country, particularly what has been described by many as ‘the perplexing security situation,’ it was not unexpected that such a proposition would generate uproar.

Nigerians who had been putting pressure on the Federal Government over activities of insurgents and sundry other criminals began to ask questions on whether the reality ordinary Nigerians endure was the same with the elite like Senator Geidam, a former governor of Yobe State.

An analyst fell short of accusing Geidam, representing Yobe East senatorial district in the National Assembly, and some other notable leaders from the North of complicity in the unending insurgency debacle. The lawyer, who asked not to be named, said “people like Geidam remind us of other Northern leaders who had, at one time or the other, shown bias in favour of those criminal elements. It all boils down to nepotism; something like he is from my part of the town and if he does something wrong, I must favour him. You don’t grow a country like that.

“Recall that before President Muhammadu Buhari became president, he chided the government of President Goodluck Jonathan for handling the Boko Haram members with iron hands. What manner of people handles killers with levity? There was also Senator Ali Ndume at that time. He is an elite of the North and we all know the allegation that trailed him in this issue. Now we have another leader from that area who had governed a state for eight years and is a national legislator. Can’t you see that this is not ordinary?”

What the source did not mention was the case of former governor of Borno, the origin state of Boko Haram, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff. There are also sundry allegations hanging around his neck that he midwifed what later became Boko Haram. Another governor, Ibrahim Shettima, has also been accused of being complicit   in the Boko Haram debacle, particularly over the mystery the disappearance of Chibok school girls.

Many other Nigerians have come hard on the bill with some querying its nationale and implication of such a law, should the bill be passed, for the country’s justice system. Their contention is that it sounds unthinkable that anyone would propose a law to pamper and expend the common wealth on terrorists who are waging war on the nation, killing and dislodging innocent people in order to occupy some parts of the country›s territory.

Many other analysts have also queried the proponent of the bill and even the government that has shown its preference for rehabilitation of the terror-killers if they considered the victims of their inhumanity, those they have killed, who are alive but maimed and rendered physically useless, orphaned or displace.

Convener of Nigerians Unite Against Terror, Joe Okei-Odumakin, while speaking on the development during the week, described the bill as “a means of recycling terrorism.” She said one of the major roles of elected politicians was to keep the country safe, suggesting that the proposition of Senator Geidam was at variance with what his constituents expected of him.

 

The religious angle

Interestingly, however, the bill has also further exposed some of the nation’s fault lines, especially the politics of religion. Reports had it that notable organisations and communities have spoken against the controversial bill. The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) as well as the Chibok community kicked against it. Chibok has become synonymous with Christian North since the abduction of over 200 female students of the community’s secondary school on April 15, 2014.

However, reports also had it that the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) is in support of the proposed agency. Even during the week, the government engaged the leadership of CAN which accused it of bias over its insistent that Boko Haram was not targeting Christians and that there were more Muslim victims than Christians. A position that some Muslim organisations seem to support but which some others have roundly condemned.  But the government had since changed its tune admitting through the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, that the terrorists were indeed waging organised attacks on Christians.

 

Giving terrorists power to hamper the law

Speaking on the proposed bill, the Executive Director of Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO), Comrade Ibuchukwu Ohabuenyi Ezike, said the development would put spanner in the work of the nation’s judicial system.

“The implication would be that the security agencies and the judiciary would be overwhelmed by the dubious activities of these terrorists, and rather than dispense justice judiciously and without fear or favour, judicial officers would be doing so in fear for their lives and those of their families, loved ones and properties.

“Giving amnesty to terrorists who took up arms against the state and its citizens without provocation is dangerous and an invitation to bigger threat to security and the citizens. It would aggravate the already ugly security situation in the country.

“What will be the fate of the victims of this terrorism, namely those who were killed, maimed, raped and whose hard-earned properties were destroyed, including their homes? You know that since the inception of the Boko Haram insurgency, some victims whose homes were devastated and razed have been living in internally displaced persons’ (IDPs) camps. Some died of diseases, hunger and destitution. There are some that were infected with communicable diseases who are still in pains as we speak.

“There are families who have been left without fathers or mothers or without kids that they hitherto had, as a result of this unprovoked terror. Seeing the perpetrators of these heinous crimes pardoned without any form of justice extended to them (the victims) means deteriorating the bad conditions of the victims.

“For us in CLO, rather than settling these terrorists for their wickedness, we would propose that government uses the resources for doing so to rehabilitate the victims and cause them to begin to reintegrate into the society,” he said.

Also, Yoruba leader and Secretary-General of Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE), Dr Kunle Olajide, viewed the proposed bill with disdain. In an interview with Sunday Tribune, Olajide posited that the move would encourage criminality, saying that the development what totally different with what happened during the era of amnesty for Niger Delta militants.

“The war is still raging; they kill and maim on a daily basis. You don’t consider amnesty anywhere in the world until the war is over and you have established conquest. In other words, one party surrendered to other; that is when you consider amnesty or an international organisation, a non-partisan welfare, comes to broker peace. Then, you think of amnesty on both sides.

“But almost on a daily basis, we have been threatened by Shekau or whatever they call him and he threatened to capture our president; he cannot.

And in any case, you talk of de-radicalisation; it cannot happen in three, six months or one year. Unemployed youths who are aggrieved and who have taken part in the plunder and massacring innocent babies, mothers and men, they now pretend to surrender and you take them to camp and said you have de-radicalise them. You want to radicalise them straight into the society. Human rights doesn’t work like that.

“First and foremost, they are going to or they should have their informants among the Boko Haram men. Secondly, even if their leaders should pretend to have surrendered, you get them into the camp and after a few months, you now want to rehabilitate them. I think the proposed bill went further to say they would give them money to go and start businesses.

“So, what you are saying in effect is that those unemployed youths should join Boko Haram and after a few months, they would have killed many people and they would come back and say they have repented. You don’t fund insurgency yourself and the Federal Government should have it in mind that it is federal money that is being used to fight this insurgency and to fund the rehabilitation camps. That is the money that belongs to all parts of this country.  And Boko Haram is a direct product of mis-governance in the Northern states. I have said it often times,” he said.

The medical doctor also traced the problem, particularly in the North, to the sentiment of the region, which he said had started since the pre-colonial period. He said that while the Western part of the country was empowering its people with education, under Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the Northern elite was concentrating on military empowerment, oblivious of emerging technology that only education could engender,” he stated.

Olajide who advocated a complete overhaul of the country’s political structure or implementation of the report of the 2014 National Conference, warned against allowing pernicious  bill such as the one brought into the Senate by Geidam.

The YCE scribed warned of dire consequences should the bill scale through in the National Assembly. According to him,  “the implications are tremendous… no fewer than 80 per cent of our youths are roaming the streets, especially in the Northern part of this country.  When they see that the people who rebelled against the system and committed murder being treated with kid gloves and, in fact, being funded to become their masters, when they see the rewards of fighting against the system and killing innocent people, they will be encouraged to also go into crime.

“Secondly, instead of the Federal Government and the various state governments concentrating on human capacity development, improving education facilities, compelling parents to educate their children, sanctioning the parents who failed to do so, now, they are promoting insurgency.

“There are lots of dangers in it for the entire country, more so, for those areas and the entire country, because they spill over here,” he warned.

But as many Nigerians are calling for a complete rejection of the said bill, some are worried that given the body language and pronouncements of the current Senate, especially its decision to support the Buhari administration, it might want to dare the consequences and go ahead with it. The argument of those who hold this view is that the former Yobe State governor was merely used as a front, as they alleged that the bill is part of the agenda of the Federal Government under President Buhari.

The coming weeks will tell if the government will drop the alleged agenda of providing direct funding for terrorists in the name of rehabilitation. It will also be clear whether or not the Senate leadership, which has announced to Nigerians that it will be supporting the Buhari government because it believes that anything that comes from the Executive will be good enough for the country, will listen to the majority of the people who elected them to make laws for the country by kicking out the bill. Whatever the direction the wind blows, the whole world is watching.