By Emeka Alex Duru
(08054103327, nwaukpala@yahoo.com)
Before rolling out the drums and spreading its arms for ‘repentant’ Boko Haram fighters, the Federal Government, may need to reflect on the Trojan horse legend to appreciate the reality of deceit as a strategy in warfare. The Trojan horse was simply a wooden horse used by the Greeks to enter the city of Troy and win their war with Troy between the 13th and 12 Century BC. It was a strategy of surprise in which the Greeks caught their opponents napping.
The story tells that after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks constructed a huge wooden horse and hid a select force of men inside. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a trophy. That night the Greek force crept out of the horse and opened the gates for the rest of the Greek army, which had sailed back under cover of night. The Greeks entered and destroyed the city of Troy, ending the war. Metaphorically, “Trojan horse” has come to mean a ploy to dislodge an opponent through surprise and subterfuge.
Some uncanny developments make it necessary to invoke this analogy. The recent statement by the Minister for Information, Lai Mohammed on the ‘repentant’ insurgents, is scary. According to the minister, the Federal Government will not prosecute repentant Boko Haram insurgents because doing is against global best practice. “You cannot just shoot them because there are international conventions that give rights also to prisoners of war. What the military is doing is that, when they surrender, they profile them to ensure that they are genuine and reintegrate them into the society”, the minister said, during his engagement with the media in Washington DC. This is loaded with uncertainties.
But more frightening is a disclosure in a United Nations’ publication regarding a secret programme by the Nigerian government tagged Suhlu, designed to pull commanders of terrorists groups, including Boko Haram and the Islamic State for West African Province (ISWAP) out of the forests, rehabilitate them and provide them a means of livelihood. It exposed the efforts by the government to reach out to senior jihadist fighters in the bush for a peace deal as a way of ending the lingering war.
Now, the desperation on the part of the federal government to end the insurgency is understandable. In the last 12 years that the war has lasted, it has taken toll on the nation’s human and material resources, exposed us as a country, tall in stature but short in might. The insurgency and accompanying banditry in the North West have combined to mock Nigeria as a nation that cannot guarantee security of life and property to its citizens. This speaks a lot in state and leadership failure. If the government is therefore trying to end the war and save face, there could be meaning in the agenda.
The concern is the haste and enthusiasm with which the romance is being consummated. It is not usual for someone offering forgiveness to be more excited that the person that has wronged him. Repentance and atonement should naturally precede amnesty. But that does not appear to be the angle the government is taking it.
The first note of caution is that terrorism is ideological. Terrorists hardly let go of their conviction, which for them, is matter of life and death. In this particular instance, this would not be the first time the government would be reaching out to the terrorists to lay down their arms, without success. Recall that on occasions in the past when the government had offered hands of peace to the terrorists, they had sold a dummy of repentance, made material gains out of the efforts to rearm and launch more devastating attacks on the people. There is nothing to suggest that the current attempt at appeasement will achieve different results.
The fighters coming out of the bush to renounce their old path, may be exciting but fraught with uncertainties. The immediate task is to determine whether the surrender is genuine or a ruse to activate and coordinate terror sleeper cells across the country. I am tempted to suspect the latter, given the experiences in the past.
But there are other more critical considerations. Late Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Chukwudifu Oputa, made great efforts at elaborating the three principles of justice – justice to the accused, justice to the victim, justice to the society.
In the haste to embrace and integrate the ‘repentant’ insurgents, the federal government owes to Nigerians the duty of explanation on the aspect of justice it intends to pursue. It appeals to assume that by the actions and pronouncements of its senior officials, the government is more interested in serving justice to the terrorists (the accused), leaving the victims and the society to lick their wounds. No system survives on that. There cannot be justice without equity.
Since the insurgents launched their murderous offensives in 2009, they have left in their wake, blood and sorrow, with estimated 200,000 Nigerians and residents killed. Religious centres, markets, schools, farms, hospitals, police and military formations have also been attacked. Apart from outright armed attacks on targets, members of the group have equally engaged in suicide bombings, abduction of students, raids on villages and kidnap of travelers, among other criminal activities.
The crisis has also displaced over three million Nigerians from their homes and has contributed to food crises and famines particularly in the north East as farmers can no longer visit their farms. North-East presently accounts for nearly 60 per cent of the 13 million out-of-school children in the country, due to the activities of insurgents.
For four consecutive years, Nigeria is being ranked alongside Afghanistan and Iraq as the most terrorized countries due to the activities of the insurgents, bandits and criminal Fulani herdsmen, mostly. This has caused so much harm to Nigeria and has discouraged investors from the country.
These are not costs and considerations that should be brushed aside because the government wants to make peace with the insurgents. It is essential to ascertain that the insurgents had truly repented. Those found to have played key roles in the war, should be subjected to trial. The best the government can do is to ensure speedy and transparent trial before forgiveness. Integrating them into the system, especially in the security agencies, should not be contemplated.
Eyes are on the government on how it handles the ‘repentant’ Boko Haram issue. That will go a long way in demonstrating its commitment to justice and equity. It will amount to double standards, if the government cuddles terrorists who have waged war on the country, inflicted pains on the citizens, while hounding unarmed agitators for self-determination. That will amount to taking injustice too far.