Nigeria Times

By Atadoga Atojoko

Since 2009 when the Boko Haram group began a violent campaign in Nigeria, hundreds of lives have been lost and millions displaced. The continued bombings, killings, kidnappings, and the destruction of properties by Boko Haram have become of great concern to the Nigerian government and the international community. The activities of Boko Haram have effects on the economy and the people.

However, the year 2015 marked the beginning of a fresh offensive against the group by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari. On assumption of office, President Muhammadu Buhari appointed new service chiefs and relocated the military command center dedicated to the fight against Boko Haram to the northeast and probed past weapons procurement.

This move was hailed in many quarters as a proactive approach needed to decimate the Boko Haram terrorist group. And true to the postulations, the Nigerian Military gained ascendency over the Boko Haram terrorist group by reclaiming territories in Nigeria hitherto under the control of the group. The operational headquarters of the group in Sambisa forest was also taken over by the Nigerian troops, and this saw to the Boko Haram group settling at the fringes of the Lake Chad Basin region from where they regroup and lunch offensives in Nigeria.

The Nigerian Army also led search and rescue operations that led to the rescue of a large number of the abducted Chibok girls to the admiration of all and sundry. According to Abel Unwauba, a professor of military History in the Nigerian Defense Academy, he stated that the Nigerian Military was able to gain ascendency over the Boko Haram group due to the commitment of the political leadership in the country at the time.

He further opined that President Muhammadu Buhari got it right with the quality of Service Chiefs who hit the ground running, given the precarious situation of things on the ground.

From 2016 to date, the Nigerian Military has continually engaged the Boko Haram group and, to a large extent, was able to confine their activities to fringes of the Lake Chad Basin region. Their ability to carry out suicidal attacks in most towns and cities were greatly hampered by the various measures put in place and the robust security coordination by the hierarchy of the Nigerian Military. This much was corroborated by the avalanche of commendations that poured in, saluting the efforts of the Nigerian Military thus far.

The recent news coming from the Boko Haram camp is an indication that the Nigerian Military has indeed lived up to expectations as far as the fight against terrorism in Nigeria is concerned. That no Nigerian territory is under the control of the Boko Haram group is an indication that in no distant time the Boko Haram group would be history and normalcy would return to North-East Nigeria.

In some quarters, it has been stated that the Boko Haram group is seeking a pardon from the federal government in the attempt to lay down their arms. The implication of this is that indeed the Boko Haram camp is experiencing a leadership crisis under Abubakar Shekau.

According to Dr. Eugene Iwodi, a lecturer in the department of International Relations of the Obafemi Awolowo University, the fact that some top commanders of the Boko Haram group are seeking for state pardon indicates that the tide has changed and what is left is for the Nigerian Military to go all out in clearance operations.

Dr. Iwodi further opined that the number of deaths recorded in North-East Nigeria due to the insurgency from 2016 to date is a fraction of what was recorded from 2009 to 2015. He stated that for the group to enlist the support of organizations such as the United Nations for state pardon indicates that what is left of the sect is a highly demoralized group of people seeking a way out of their predicament.

This is where the political authorities in Nigeria must be given credit. The administration of President Muhammadu has done well in this regard by ensuring that the Military is up to the task with regards to neutralizing the threats posed by the Boko Haram group.

As it stands, it is common knowledge that the Boko Haram group has been neutralized. This much is evident in the series of overtures extended to President Muhammadu Buhari for a state pardon. It is also on the heels that some of the top commanders of the Boko Haram group have expressly stated that they no longer want to be a part of the group. The implication is that Abubakar Shekau is a lone ranger and there is little he can do but to surrender.

The Nigerian Military must be commended for achieving this feat. Worthy of mention is the Chief of Army Staff, who has been leading the troops from the frontline. This is especially so given the fact that this recent posturing of Boko Haram commanders is occasioned by the recent relocation of the Chief of Army Staff to the Theater of Operations and credited to be leading the onslaught against the Boko Haram group.

It is thus apparent that if this present tempo is sustained, the end of Boko Haram might be in sight. All that is required in this current circumstance is for the military authorities to intensify efforts towards the final decimation of the Boko Haram group. The disposition of the Chief of Army Staff is worthy of commendation. It is hoped that the tempo is sustained to bring to an end to the Boko Haram crisis.

The political authorities’ must also take advantage of this present situation of Boko Haram commanders begging for mercy to do the needful in the overall interest of the country and the families and relatives of those that have paid the supreme price in service to fatherland.

Atojoko is a counter-terrorism expert and wrote from Lagos.

By Abiodun Israel

Publisher of Sahara Reporters, Omoyele Sowore must be truly desperate in his anti-Nigerian Army/anti-Buratai agenda going by his latest outing in which he interviewed one Mike Omorege, a purported retired sergeant of the Nigerian Army. The crux of the rehearsed interview on SaharaTV is that “Buhari Must Sack Buratai For Nigeria To Defeat Boko Haram,” which was later cast as the headline published on Sahara Reporters and aggressively marketed in the social media. Much as Sahara Reporters presented the interview as being a question and answer session between interviewer and interviewee, what came out of the interaction is Sowore getting someone else to parrot points he wants to make. He therefore owns responsibility for everything said in the interview, not just because he is the publisher but also because he created a persona to deliver messages that are his.

The interview is rich in conjectures, sparse on facts and completely lacking in logic. It is also ridiculous that the interview settled for a “retired sergeant” when it could have reached higher up for someone who at least has the basic knowledge of military strategy and maneuvering. Conscious of the lacking stature of his interview subject, he was quick to include in the script for Omorege to say “If you want to get the truth, as long as you are interviewing the senior officers, you won’t get the truth, it’s the soldiers on the ground that will tell you what is happening there.” Sowore could have resorted to his old trick of having such a “relevant soldier” mask up to give the interview or the other trick of using actors to impersonate actual soldiers but instead he reached for an inconsequential sacked sergeant as prop. So why did Sowore pull such stunt?

Anyone new to the nuisance called Sowore must learn that he is obsessed with the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. General Tukur Buratai and by extension the Nigerian Army as an institution. Known for his penchant to blackmail high ranking public officers, Buratai is Sowore’s unconquered territory – the one person who called his bluff without consequences. Buratai’s refusal to succumb to blackmail gave Sowore a blackeye as it opened the eyes of other public office holders to the possibility of calling Sahara Reporters’ bluff, which is bad for business and has led to the erosion of the cult following that the publication once enjoyed.

Since placing series of failed hits on the COAS, the shock and awe that come from being misrepresented on Sahara Reporters has become stuff that will only be reference in media studies book, like “How Not to Be a Journalist”. The failed attempt to tarnish the reputation of the Army and its leadership include the dubious comparative satellite images of mass graves for members of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) somewhere in Kaduna state; a Commission of Inquiry which expert members couldn’t find the supposed mass grave afterwards. There was the staged video of soldiers protesting the quality of their food, but none of them stepped forward when authorities wanted to verify the claim. Sowore has published several videos targeted at projecting Boko Haram as a superior force without thoughts for how this constitute to promotion of terrorists’ propaganda. Added to the mix are salacious reports bordering on corruption in the army, but none has been proven beyond the playing to public opinion.

Sowore’s anger and frustration at Buratai’s growing relevance in the nation’s security architecture has seen him acted as the coordinator of several character assassination campaigns against him. Notable among such engagements are the attacks commissioned by Amnesty International, IMN, the opposition and in a few instances people that see themselves as heirs apparent in the Nigerian Army if Buratai is nudged out of the way. His misadventure as a presidential candidate with 38,000 votes was to earn him a badge that bestows the questionable immunity that the international interests procure for subversive agents that are executing their interests in Nigeria.

With the little insight into some of the things that are frustrating Sowore, it is then pertinent to touch on the failed issues raised in the interview in which he persistently asked his retired Sergeant Omorege guided questions to produce responses that they had apparently adequately rehearsed before the actual show. The greatest distortion in the interview is the universal use of the word “corrupt” to describe “most of the Nigerian Army senior officers,” which presupposes that it would not be possible to find suitable replacements for the current leadership when their tenure is done. It means Sowore would have appointed a sergeant as his Chief of Army Staff if he had the chance since all those of higher ranks are irredeemably corrupt. The flip side would be for the country to replace the entire army with the Civil Defence Corps or Sowore’s IMN clients.

Another fraudulent claim in the staged play is Omorege’s assertion that “The Nigerian Army officers don’t want the war to end because they know what they are doing and the business they are doing.” But in the next breadth he claimed that removing General Buratai as COAS will end the war. First, does this imply that whoever will succeed Buratai is not currently of the officer cadre and higher? Two, if removing Buratai will by default end the war, does it mean the ex-Sergeant and Sowore have a pact with Boko Haram that the exit of the COAS is the condition for ending their terrorism? Three, if Omorege was really ever in the army, would he have really described the act of laying one’s life down to secure the country as a business regardless of what shortcomings may exist? This nauseating assertion and the one that provided the platform for it to be made are irresponsible in the worst way conceivable.

Even more irresponsible is the claim that there is no big deal to Boko Haram. There is a big deal and it is a really big deal. The first big deal is that the likes of Sowore and his associates like Ahmad Salkida, the BringBackOurGirls crowd, Amnesty International and others are offering all manners of support to the terrorist group in addition to the third-party nations, whose geo-strategic interests and engagements directly or indirectly empowers the terrorists. Because Sowore is more vested in the bread and butter he gets from this blood-tainted engagement he either ignores this connection or is incapable of understanding the dynamics at play in this regard. The other big deal is that the Boko Haram criminality evolved into a franchise of ISIS (Islamic State), which internationalized their activities with the resulting drawbacks in efforts to flush them out.

Thirdly, the Nigerian military’s fight against Boko Haram’s terrorism is a big deal where weapons and other hardware are concerned. The activities of people like Sowore with his Sahara Reporters, Amnesty International and others that make it impossible for Nigeria to get the End User Certificates needed for such military procurements because they lie about human rights record. Boko Haram terrorists have no need for such certificates as Sowore’s clients readily supply them weapons under the cover of the night and even in broad daylight in recent times.

If the foregoing revealed a man desperate to the point of becoming unreasonable then what took the cake was the laughable assertion by the interviewee to “Let the troops on ground decide who they want, they’ll be motivated and happy to fight instead of bringing the lazy ones to lead the soldiers.” Like seriously? Even the United States where Sowore likely picked up his so-called democratic outlook from does not practice such insanity of allowing troops vote to choose who the military leader should be. The leadership of an Army is not a popularity contest; it is about experience, succession chain, competence and the discretion of the commander-in-chief.

Knowing Sowore and his past modus operandi, the interview with retired Sergeant Omorege is a false flag operation to test the waters and see the response of the state, especially at a time like this when attention is focused on containing the spread of the corona virus and managing the impact of the necessitated lockdown on the populace. When he used actors to stage troops’ dissatisfaction with food rations in the past and when he used masked persons as interview subjects previously the impact was incitement within the military.

It would seem whatever Sowore is planning right now is big, with the consequence that the federal government and the military services must not be caught napping. It will be a grave miscalculation to assume that Buratai is the target of this interview, the COAS has repeatedly proven to be a target greater than Sowore can handle. Sahara Reporters’ target seems to be a concerted effort to sow disaffection within the military in a manner that will lead to the overthrow of the government, something Sowore has always been in on since the opposition was trounced at the 2019 General Elections. Those who call the shots should watch him closely and take measures to derail his latest plot.

Abiodun is a public affairs analyst and wrote from Lagos.

By Best Agbese

In the last one decade, Nigeria has been a country troubled by insecurities. It is assailed by several internal conflicts and crises which have exalted the strength of nationhood. What has battled more than a few is the vested interests by some external and evil nations in promoting terrorism in Nigeria.

The agenda of destabilization and instigation of a possible break-up of Nigeria is pursued with vigour. Nigeria would have been crumbled as a nation through the bondage of insecurities imposed on the country by Boko Haram terrorists; violent separatists’ campaigners, bile militancy, ethno-religious extremists, armed bandits and cattle rustlers, communal clashes, kidnappers and other assorted forms of criminalities.

And the sociological character of these criminally violent acts indicate politically motivated and instigated crises by sponsored armed criminals to clatter Nigerians, in alliance with foreign agents of destabilization. They are programmed to pierce a sharp knife of division and disunity among the people. It has been tough, disgusting and frustrating.

But Almighty God has always been faithful in the protection of Nigeria by preparing the country to face all eventualities. And that’s the only reason the country has remained one unified and unbreakable sovereign nation.

Therefore, anytime insecurities accentuate to dangerous levels, the country is blessed with a leader and a Nigerian Army to come to the rescue at its most critical moments. When the Chief of Army staff, and tsar of the counter-insurgency operations in Nigeria, Lt. Gen. Tukur Yusufu Buratai launched innovations and imposed reforms on the Nigerian Army, not many Nigerians sighted his wisdom.

The end result has been the repositioning of Nigerian Army into a professional, responsive, disciplined, patriotic, loyal, humane, courageous and gallant soldiers, alive to their constitutional responsibilities of defending Nigeria at all times. The soldiers of Nigerian Army are active conquerors of terrorists; consuming fires of armed bandits, the nemesis of armed separatists’ agitators, the soothing balm of ethno-religious warlords, a thorn in the flesh of violent militants and the symbol of phobia for the plethora of armed criminals terrorizing the country.

Nigeria is one African country indubitably, the most tormented by terrorism, before the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, Boko Haram insurgents pranced the landscapes of Nigeria, as unchallengeable demigods. Insurgents threw Nigerians into a perpetual wailing chamber as they designed and launched horrendous atrocities as well as gruesome killings of Nigerians.

Compatriots were abducted freely and their communities annihilated unmolested. Boko Haram had erected a country in a country within the territorial boundaries of Nigeria. They boasted virtually every week in released videos about their invincible prowess and derisively mocked the people, the Army or government, as untouchables of the warfront.

From the North to the Southern fringes of the country, incensed Boko Haram insurgents roared and proudly resonated the sounds of war on Nigeria. But the incensed terrorists have lost this voice of braggadocio and strength. Only those who are blindfolded by partisanship have refused to see the impacts and of course, they will never sight it, even if the positive images of valour of Nigerian Army is rubbed on their eyelids.

Pleasurably, the nonsense of terrorists ended when Gen. Buratai came on the stage to led the war against insurgency. He is famed as a dogged professional soldier and prodigious war monger with a million strategies and tactics. He is noiseless, but very proficient and an asset to Nigeria in the battlefield. Gen. Buratai dreads no terrorists’ foes of Nigeria, but uncompromisingly and voraciously munches the beasts in the warfront.

Initially, insurgents undermined the competence of Gen. Buratai because of the disheveled and disoriented Army, the insurgents knew he inherited. Before Gen. Buratai’s arrival as COAS and the special mandate to lead the battle, Boko Haram undermined the entire Nigerian Military.

Regrettably, terrorist’s initial misconception of the Army under a new leadership would soon prove to insurgents that they boobed to their peril. It did not take long before reversal of fortunes on the battlefield against terrorists became a singsong in Nigeria and the international community. Boko Haram insurgents started fudging in the terror war they started against Nigeria.

Gen. Buratai’s invasion of the Northeast with repositioned and professionalized soldiers, Boko Haram had literally dug their graves. Nigerian troops reclaimed all territories they captured and occupied in the Northeast. Soldiers combed every corner of the Northeast, and insurgents lost grounds to Nigerian troops in the battlefield, with each passing day. Terrorists squealed in the warfront like trapped animals, a fate they least envisaged would befall them.

Soon Boko Haram factional leader, Abubakar Shekau, his top commanders and foot soldiers realized no part of Nigerian territory offered them a base or protection to assemble and come out to unleash terror on Nigerians.

With Gen. Buratai leading the battle which unraveled the dreary myth of Sambisa forest and leveled it to the ground, Shekau and his comrades discovered their last shelter had been seized by the Army. Terrorists scattered in search of safety in distant and neighbouring lands like Chad, Cameroun and Niger republics.

For Abubakar Shekau, escaping the Northeast assailed everywhere by Nigerian soldiers was an uphill task. He could no longer hold his pride, but disguised like a woman before escaping the vigilance of security agents to seek refuge in the caves and forests of the Cameroun. He became less visible on the battle turf; his hoarse voice of threats also became less audible; and his foot soldiers dreaded the warfront.

And came the Abu Musab Al-Barnewi’s faction of Boko Haram, which specializes in attacking military formations. They equally found the Nigerian Army a nut too difficult to crack. Nigerian troops again faced them ferociously, and humbled the terrorists each day they launched an attack. Many were neutralized and sent to their early graves in the course of battle.

Both the Abubakar Shekau-led faction of Boko Haram and Musab Al-Barnewi faction as well as other emerging terror sects like Ansaru, led by Mamman Nur and hordes of others wanted to retake the Nigerian territories at all cost. But unfortunately for the congregation of terror sects, none could effectively triumph over Nigerian Army. It has been a doomed mission, as rather, the superior might of Nigerian Army enervated and expired them in droves.

While Boko Haram foot soldiers who bowed to the swords of Nigerian Army are countless, scores of insurgents’ top commanders were either captured or surrendered to Nigerian Army. And in the near five years of the counter-insurgency operations in the Northeast, the battle strength of Boko Haram terrorists waned and diminished.

Sensing that the original Boko Haram sect and the splinter terrorism sects which are sponsored to converge on Nigeria could not repress the Nigerian Army to consume Nigeria in their atrocious acts. So, the Musab Al-Barnewi Boko Haram faction had to be energized by their sponsors in Iran. Thus, the Boko Haram faction morphed into the Islamic West Africa Province (ISWAP) terrorists and with higher sponsorship from the external agents of the devil.

ISWAP has powered the operations of the weakened Musab Al Barnewi’s Boko Haram sect in both foot soldiers and weapons supply. But for nearly a year of operations in Nigeria, the mission to recapture Nigeria has remained futile to terrorists. The desperation of terrorists in Borno state, at the fringes of Lake Chad area is borne out of the burning anger of terrorists’ frustrations in the battle.

Nigerian troops have come this far in the counter-terrorism operations even without the assistance of external armies physically on the battlefield. Nigerian Army has maintained its positive records of super performances even in international Peace Keeping Missions, across the globe and variously acknowledged by foreign countries and world organizations like the United Nations (UN).

Nigerian soldiers have etched its name in gold as the pride of Africa on warfare, as evident in their confrontation of the combination of Boko Haram insurgents and the external terrorists’ godfathers. Nigerian Army has gallantly held them headlong and triumphantly on the frontlines. Some security experts have even rated Nigerian Army as one of the best in the world.

Agbese is a PhD student at University of Dundee,Scotland, United Kingdom.