By Obi Nwakanma
On Wednesday, terrorists operating in Shiroro, Niger State,
massacred numerous people, including about 42 Nigerian soldiers and policemen,
and an unknown, unaccountable number of civilians at a mining site. Among those
missing, according to certain media reports, are some Chinese. Just for
context, the areas around the Shiroro Dam are where ISWAP fighters months ago
mounted their flag, claiming them as their territory.
*Buhari
The story of this attack seems to have very plainly justified their assertion of sovereign control over that part of Niger State, or any other part of Nigeria, where security reports indicate, to all intents and purposes, that the Nigerian authorities seem to have lost control.
According to media reports, these attackers came heavily armed and started shooting in the Ajata-Aboki area where the mines are located. What they are mining with the Chinese, nobody knows. But the soldiers in the nearby town of Erena, not far from the scene of the massacre, were alerted, and deployed. They fell into an ambush. In the firefight, about 32 soldiers were said to have lost their lives. Wrap your heads around this figure, dear reader, and it will slowly sink in: that what was destroyed is an entire battalion! How did this happen?
What operational faux pas could have led to the wiping out of an entire Nigerian battalion inside Nigeria in a situation which is currently not even classified as a war situation. What is the nature of this conflict?
Here is the most infuriating thing: the president of Nigeria and his aides
continue to lie to Nigerians with little compunction and with little
consequence. Why? Because Nigeria’s National Assembly is a toothless bulldog.
Or its key members are complicit with the President in what is possibly
unfolding as the largest, most complex conspiracy against the federation of
Nigeria.
On Thursday, following the attack, the President’s Senior Aide on Public Affairs, Garba Shehu said the following on behalf of the president: “We honour our security forces, and particularly those brave souls who have given their lives fighting against the evil that is terrorism. They constitute the best that Nigeria has to offer and we remember each of them. Sadly, Nigeria’s fight against terrorism continues. It is a battle that is taking its toll on all of us. But we shall not relent, nor shall we surrender. We say it again that we have reduced Boko Haram to a shell of its former self. But terrorists are parasites. They thrive when the world is suffering.”
This
statement from the President’s office sounds too much like tongue-in-cheek. It
lacks sincerity. It is the repeat of the ineffectual hogwash which Mr. Buhari
and his inner circle have been mouthing since 2015.
All that bull about reducing Boko Haram “to a shell of its
former self,” is false in all its material particular. Okay, you did not
“reduce” or degrade Boko Haram, Mr. Buhari. Rather, Boko Haram expanded by
integrating its mission with ISWAP which is currently an alliance of the Fulani
Herdsmen, Boko Haram, and the ISIS in West Africa. Boko Haram was given a new
lease of life under Buhari. It became embedded inside the Nigerian military and
security forces. It expanded its strategic contacts. Many of its fighters were
integrated into the Armed Forces of Nigeria and circulated through the various
military formations across Nigeria where they operate as sleeper cells, in some
instances, and active cells, in other instances.
Our security failures cannot be without explanation. Those who
doubt me should go and look at what Buhari himself said about Boko Haram and
the Jonathan campaign against them prior to 2015. The plot to change Nigeria
politically is an on-going game, and it is taking all kinds of shapes. There are
whispers, in certain knowledgeable quarters, that insist that the current rapid
degeneration of Nigeria’s security is manufactured. That the current situation
is designed, and intended to secure leverage for key operators of the system.
Nothing else can explain the sudden inability of the Nigerian
Armed Forces to defend Nigeria. It has been deliberately, operationally
compromised from the highest quarters. Imagine therefore that at the heights of
this, the institution of state is deliberately collapsed, and an extraneous
force, like ISWAP takes over the country and acquires the power to govern and
execute consent. This is a power game. National security is at the very heart
of this power game. When a country is under external and internal attack, it is
in a situation of war. Nigeria is practically in a war situation given
developments that currently confront her.
The image Nigerians now see is that the Nigerian Armed Forces
seem currently overwhelmed by the external aggression by an external force now
called ISWAP whose strategic goal is to occupy Nigeria and overthrow its
national government, and impose a strange Islamic rule called Sharia. Let me
build a scenario that is likely to occur as we move through the election year
2023. As every Nigerian knows who follows the news, Mr. Muhammadu Buhari
declared about three weeks ago that he was not in the business for “a third
term” – which would be an illegal extension of the tenure of the Presidency.
The interesting part of this is not what the President said, but
why? Why is he suddenly saying, in spite of the clear unneccessity of it, that
he is not interested in a “third term.” Who asked him? What prompted him? As we
have since come to see, everything Muhammadu Buhari says or does is coded in
some layer of subterfuge. But here is the critical point: as the election
season draws nearer and unfolds, we are going to see a rapid surge in these
so-called terrorist attacks.
They will heighten their campaigns across Nigeria, where many
are already located and embedded in the Military barracks. From now to February
2023, Nigeria is going to witness a high rate of external attacks, like what
happened in Shiroro, by so called ISWAP fighters, and internal, deadly attacks
– kidnappings, violent sackings of communities; city lock downs, etc., because
of insecurity.
A huge event in Abuja will trigger a massive national response.
Because just as conflict is manufactured, so is consent. There will be a
further closure of businesses because the roads – the routes of National
exchange – can no longer be travelled. Increasingly, as they cut off Nigerians;
and as it becomes increasingly difficult and unsafe to fly, the prospects will
be lowered for the long political campaigns. The deliberate economic
strangulation, aimed very strategically from the very beginning of Buhari’s
administration to equalize poverty – that is, pauperize and reduce every
Nigerian irrespective of status to the same level of desperation, and therefore
weaken them, would have achieved its strategic aim. Hunger afterall is a
strategic instrument of war.
You may have all the naira or dollar in your pocket, but you may
not see gas, or fuel, or bread, or beans to buy, because there is no road to
move them. You exist in radical confinement and fear. This is what is going on
in Nigeria and it will grow worse. Because the infrastructure of movement would
have been reduced, there will be no political campaigns. The candidates will
have a situation whereby their ability to travel up and down Nigeria would be
reduced, lest they be kidnapped, assassinated, or disappeared on the campaign
trail. Moreso, because of the scarcity of Aviation fuel, that will close down
many airlines, but as well for a growing uncertainty about air travel, because
if these “terrorists” can hijack a train, nothing says they cannot hijack and
crash a plane in Nigeria.
All these would come to a head around February 2023, I predict,
when it would all become clear that the Federal Government may not be in a
position to conduct elections in Nigeria as a result of insecurity. By this
point, Muhammadu Buhari would have assumed the guise of a disinterested and
neutral party. Even if the parties and Nigerians manage to pressure him into
conducting an election, the results will be so disputed and disreputable, that
it will snowball into a national security situation which “a responsible
government cannot ignore.”
It is on this basis, therefore, that Mr. Buhari and the National
Assembly, under its current leadership, will trigger article 3 (Section 180) of
the Constitution: “If the Federation is at war in which the territory of
Nigeria is physically involved and the President considers that it is not
practicable to hold elections, the National Assembly may be(sic) resolution
extend the period of four years mentioned in subsection (2) of this section
from time to time, but no such extension shall exceed a period of six months at
any one time.”
*Obi Nwakanma, a US-based Nigerian academic and poet, is a commentator on public issues
One can smell a rat
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