At last, the international community is coming into the
fight against the Boko Haram insurgents. CHIKA OTUCHIKERE looks at the
intervention as the last straw that would break the Boko Haram’s back.
What can be described as quasi-warfare is about to breakout between Nigeria, the global community, on one side and the now dreaded Boko Haram insurgents, their sponsors and sympathisers, on the other side.
The Boko Haram insurgents on the midnight of 14 April 2014, forcefully took away 276 female students from the Government Secondary School, Chibok in Borno State, Nigeria. Reports from Maiduguri said the insurgents, clad in military camouflages, loaded the girls, age ranging from 16 to 18 into trucks and drove them some hundreds of kilometres into a forest.
Nigerians, who before, have been enveloped in the fear of the Boko Haram insurgents were livid at the effrontery and impunity.
Few days later, the military released a statement saying that more than 100 of 279 kidnapped girls had been freed. They shortly after swallowed their claim and retracted the statement after parents of the missing school girls came out and howled that their girls were still missing.
This development dimmed the integrity of the security forces in the eyes of the average Nigerian and even members of the international community.
When reports started filtering out, supposedly, from camp boko haram camp that the students had been shared among the insurgents as wives and mistresses, Nigerians began to scream to the federal government to intervene and retrieve the girls from the insurgents grip.
The federal government which also felt disconcerted by the military gaffe immediately rose up with a committee. This was however after Nigerians across the states as well as the international community began to stage protests demanding that the government and the military must wrestle the girls from the stranglehold of the insurgents.
Reports also came out that many of the students had been taken to the neighbouring countries of Chad and Cameroon, giving Chibok Schoolgirls saga an international dimension. The Sambisa forest, well within the Nigerian Territorial borders, is considered a safe haven for Boko Haram, but impenetrable for the security agencies.
With hindsight, the Boko Haram insurgents had struck in an outskirt of the Abuja metropolis, Nyanya, killing over 100 persons in a suicide bombing. They followed it up on the same spot two weeks later killing 23 persons (official figures).
It is instructive to include that rather than politican seeing the incident as a colossal national tragedy and tackle it headlong, they began to trade the blame game, fighting war of words. The ruling People’s Democratic Party, PDP accused the main opposition, the All Progressive Congress, APC, of masterminding the various attacks and sponsoring the insurgents. The APC fired back that the PDP’s indolence and clueless leadership was responsible for the escalation of the insurgency.
Three weeks into the girls’ abduction, controversy started to rage about the veracity of the claim that schoolgirls were kidnapped and the number of those kidnapped. The First Lady, Patience Jonathan ,was reported to have said the girls were not missing while On 2 May, the police said it was still unclear the exact number of students who were abducted. They asked parents to come up with documents so an official count could be taken.
Two days later President Goodluck Jonathan spoke publicly about the kidnapping for the first time, saying the government was doing everything it could to find the missing girls.
Parents and others took to social media to complain about the government’s perceived slow and inadequate response. Most of the affected parents were afraid to speak publicly for fear their daughters would be targeted for reprisal.
Following invigorated protests held in major Western cities, including USA Britain and Canada, using the hash tag #BringBackOurGirls, the international community moved with assistance.
Reflecting on the episode, it becomes apparent that this may as well be the last battle the boko haram insurgents would fight with the Nigerian people. Nigerians expect that with the federal government succumbing to pressure and allowing the international community to come in with technical support, the days of the Boko Haram insurgents were numbered.
According to sources in the security forces, the Boko Haram insurgents have attained the status of an international terrorists group, an appellation the federal government hitherto, feared to brand them. This, the source said informed the current intervention from the international community. He said that the international community, jolted by the sheer bravery of any group carting away a whopping 276 girls in one fell swoop, in any country, such group’s capabilities were beyond estimation.
The source averred that the USA may set up a military base in Nigeria following this intervention. This, he said, would have both positive and negative implications.
A translation of the word, ‘Chibok’ in the Igbo language, could mean, ‘God Is My Fighter’, spelt as ‘Chibuogu’. Before now, many Nigerians have given up hope on the ability of the government and its security forces to rout the Boko Haram insurgents from the land.
Different religions who have felt the devastation of the insurgents, had long committed the fight into the hands of God. Fasting and prayers were going on round the clock, in the various religions and their denominations across the land, calling for divine intervention.
The kidnapping of the Chibok school girls may just be the beginning of God’s intervention into the national nightmare which has prevailed for too long. Nigerians believe that the intervention of the international community would not end with the release of the girls but the total elimination of the insurgents and their sponsors from the face of the country.
Stay up to date, follow us on Twitter; @thundergist
What can be described as quasi-warfare is about to breakout between Nigeria, the global community, on one side and the now dreaded Boko Haram insurgents, their sponsors and sympathisers, on the other side.
The Boko Haram insurgents on the midnight of 14 April 2014, forcefully took away 276 female students from the Government Secondary School, Chibok in Borno State, Nigeria. Reports from Maiduguri said the insurgents, clad in military camouflages, loaded the girls, age ranging from 16 to 18 into trucks and drove them some hundreds of kilometres into a forest.
Nigerians, who before, have been enveloped in the fear of the Boko Haram insurgents were livid at the effrontery and impunity.
Few days later, the military released a statement saying that more than 100 of 279 kidnapped girls had been freed. They shortly after swallowed their claim and retracted the statement after parents of the missing school girls came out and howled that their girls were still missing.
This development dimmed the integrity of the security forces in the eyes of the average Nigerian and even members of the international community.
When reports started filtering out, supposedly, from camp boko haram camp that the students had been shared among the insurgents as wives and mistresses, Nigerians began to scream to the federal government to intervene and retrieve the girls from the insurgents grip.
The federal government which also felt disconcerted by the military gaffe immediately rose up with a committee. This was however after Nigerians across the states as well as the international community began to stage protests demanding that the government and the military must wrestle the girls from the stranglehold of the insurgents.
Reports also came out that many of the students had been taken to the neighbouring countries of Chad and Cameroon, giving Chibok Schoolgirls saga an international dimension. The Sambisa forest, well within the Nigerian Territorial borders, is considered a safe haven for Boko Haram, but impenetrable for the security agencies.
With hindsight, the Boko Haram insurgents had struck in an outskirt of the Abuja metropolis, Nyanya, killing over 100 persons in a suicide bombing. They followed it up on the same spot two weeks later killing 23 persons (official figures).
It is instructive to include that rather than politican seeing the incident as a colossal national tragedy and tackle it headlong, they began to trade the blame game, fighting war of words. The ruling People’s Democratic Party, PDP accused the main opposition, the All Progressive Congress, APC, of masterminding the various attacks and sponsoring the insurgents. The APC fired back that the PDP’s indolence and clueless leadership was responsible for the escalation of the insurgency.
Three weeks into the girls’ abduction, controversy started to rage about the veracity of the claim that schoolgirls were kidnapped and the number of those kidnapped. The First Lady, Patience Jonathan ,was reported to have said the girls were not missing while On 2 May, the police said it was still unclear the exact number of students who were abducted. They asked parents to come up with documents so an official count could be taken.
Two days later President Goodluck Jonathan spoke publicly about the kidnapping for the first time, saying the government was doing everything it could to find the missing girls.
Parents and others took to social media to complain about the government’s perceived slow and inadequate response. Most of the affected parents were afraid to speak publicly for fear their daughters would be targeted for reprisal.
Following invigorated protests held in major Western cities, including USA Britain and Canada, using the hash tag #BringBackOurGirls, the international community moved with assistance.
Reflecting on the episode, it becomes apparent that this may as well be the last battle the boko haram insurgents would fight with the Nigerian people. Nigerians expect that with the federal government succumbing to pressure and allowing the international community to come in with technical support, the days of the Boko Haram insurgents were numbered.
According to sources in the security forces, the Boko Haram insurgents have attained the status of an international terrorists group, an appellation the federal government hitherto, feared to brand them. This, the source said informed the current intervention from the international community. He said that the international community, jolted by the sheer bravery of any group carting away a whopping 276 girls in one fell swoop, in any country, such group’s capabilities were beyond estimation.
The source averred that the USA may set up a military base in Nigeria following this intervention. This, he said, would have both positive and negative implications.
A translation of the word, ‘Chibok’ in the Igbo language, could mean, ‘God Is My Fighter’, spelt as ‘Chibuogu’. Before now, many Nigerians have given up hope on the ability of the government and its security forces to rout the Boko Haram insurgents from the land.
Different religions who have felt the devastation of the insurgents, had long committed the fight into the hands of God. Fasting and prayers were going on round the clock, in the various religions and their denominations across the land, calling for divine intervention.
The kidnapping of the Chibok school girls may just be the beginning of God’s intervention into the national nightmare which has prevailed for too long. Nigerians believe that the intervention of the international community would not end with the release of the girls but the total elimination of the insurgents and their sponsors from the face of the country.
Stay up to date, follow us on Twitter; @thundergist
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