After being in denial for one whole month, President Goodluck Jonathan finally planned on May 15 to visit the besieged Chibok community in Borno State where Boko Haram terrorists abducted over 200 secondary school girls on April 14.
He disclosed the plan on his way to Paris, France, according to a statement issued on May 15 by his spokesman, Reuben Abati, “to participate in a summit convened by President Francois Hollande to discuss fresh strategies for dealing with the security threat posed by Boko Haram and other terrorist groups in West and Central Africa.”
Expected at the meeting were the leaders of Benin Republic, Cameroon, Niger and Chad. Britain, the United States and the European Union would be represented.
Abati said “the talks will give special attention to the co-ordination and intensification of efforts to curtail the destabilising activities of Boko Haram in Nigeria and neighbouring countries in the wake of the recent abduction of college girls from Chibok, Borno State.”
But news broke on May 16 as I was writing this column that Jonathan reversed gear and cancelled the visit, presumably for security reasons.
Jonathan was expected to visit troops in the troubled state. He and his handlers probably realised that it would be indefensible for him to attend such a high profile meeting in France without visiting the besieged community, which is part of Nigeria over which he superintends as not only President but also the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
But like every step he has taken in this crisis, the visit would have been belated even if he undertook it. Leadership is about symbolism.
A visit earlier would have painted the savoury picture of a president and commander-in-chief who is in control. Of course, it wouldn’t have brought back the girls, but it would have given the signal that the Nigerian state has the capacity to defend its territorial integrity.
Right now, there is doubt if in this asymmetrical war the state has the capacity to defeat Boko Haram. In fact, as things stand, Boko Haram is acting as a sovereign state and the military has lost the appetite to confront it.
This unfortunate scenario is reinforced by Jonathan’s decision to abort the Chibok trip. The commander-in-chief is fleeing from a rag-tag army of terrorists.
This is the greatest tragedy of the situation on the ground. Nigeria is slowly but steadily sliding into anarchy. Even junior military officers are becoming restive.
A statement issued on May 14 by the Director of Defence Information, Major General Chris Olukolade, confirmed that soldiers fired shots while the General Officer Commanding (GOC), 7 Division in Maiduguri, Major General Ahmed Mohammed, was addressing them.
Mohammed has been redeployed.
“The incident occurred when the bodies of four soldiers who died in an ambush while returning from patrol duties in Chibok were being conveyed to the morgue. There is calm in the cantonment and all normal operations are on-going,” Olukolade said.
But no matter how hard Olukolade tries to downplay what happened, it is a pointer to how low morale is in the military right now. The soldiers who opened fire were protesting what they saw as the betrayal of their superior officers who they accuse of putting them in harm’s way.
The soldiers were said to have been ambushed while on a special operation in Kalabalge Local Government Area where residents had in the morning of May 13 killed some insurgents and arrested others when their superiors refused their request to spend the night in one of the villages and insisted they must travel back to Maiduguri in the night.
So, if nerves are on edge and there is so much disillusionment and disquiet in the military, who is going to rescue the Chibok girls?
Sadly, the U.S. seems to have come to the same conclusion. On May 15, officials of the President Barack Obama administration asked whether the Nigerian military is able to rescue, even with international help, the abducted school girls.
Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week, U.S. officials came down heavily on the Nigerian military.
“We’re now looking at a military force that is, quite frankly, becoming afraid to even engage,” said Alice Friend, Pentagon’s Principal Director for African Affairs.
“The Nigerian military has the same challenges with corruption that every other institution in Nigeria does. Much of the funding that goes to the Nigerian military is skimmed off the top.”
At the end of the session, Friend was unable to assure the committee Chairman, Senator Robert Menendez, that the Nigerian military has the capacity for a rescue operation, even if it had “actionable intelligence” on the girls’ whereabouts and help from other countries.
What even became more evident from the hearing is the alarming level of U.S. mistrust of, if not contempt for, the Nigerian government. It runs so deep that the State Department requires Nigeria to promise not to use intelligence obtained from American intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) flights to “violate human rights.”
Friend noted at the hearing that because U.S. law forbids providing U.S. aid or training to military units suspected of committing “gross human rights violations,” it has “struggled a great deal” to find Nigerian forces with which it can work.
“Nigeria’s security forces have been slow to adapt with new strategies, new doctrines and new tactics,” she testified.
Friend, who grudgingly admitted that “as heavy-handed as the forces on the Nigerian side have been, Boko Haram has been even more brutal,” insisted that the main Nigerian force with responsibility to take the insurgency has “recently shown signs of real fear. They do not have the capabilities, the training or the equipping that Boko Haram does.”
If the U.S. is not “actively considering the deployment of forces to participate in a combined rescue mission,” as the White House spokesman, Jay Carney, said on May 14, does not trust Nigerian security forces, and is not sure that the country has the capacity to subdue Boko Haram, how will these girls be rescued?
I am one of those who strongly support the government not to agree to the demand by Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, for prisoner swap to free the girls. My reasons are simple.
First, in a war of asymmetry, terrorists should not be seen as calling the shots. Second, even if the girls are freed after releasing terrorists in jail, what stops Boko Haram from invading another village and abducting a new set of girls? And who knows what they may be demanding next when they no longer have their people behind bars? They may demand that all schools in Nigeria be shut down.
But if foreign countries are not willing to put boots on the ground and our soldiers have become weary of confronting Boko Haram, what other option do we have if these girls must be released?
That is my worry.