If you are of the fainted heart, better get off the social media. Death has come to town and it has been striking left, right and center. And the internet is bursting with pictorial information from all nooks and corners of the region’s hotspots by the minute.
The year 2020 has been generally bad for Nigeria. People have been dying from Covid-19, in the hands of Boko Haram insurgents, bandits, herdsmen and malitias disguising as innocent farmers.
I have written on this page not long ago, defending the Nigerian military, especially, for its efforts in taming the Boko Haram and reducing them to hit and run criminals. I also commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his consistent support in releasing funds requested by the military to purchase arms, armunitions and taking care of other necessary logistics.
Now, it appears that the theater of war is beginning to shift from the Northeast to the Northwest. Bandits have been brazenly invading villages in Sokoto, Zamfara, and Katsina, rustling cattle and goats, killing residents they encountered, including women and children and some times abducting even married women and girls – an exact trade mark or mode of operation of the Boko Haram.
In fact the Nigerian military recently confirmed that the Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP) are present in Zamfara operating with the local bandits.
Just last night, a village in neighbouring Katsina State was invaded and 17 women, including two young girls were abducted, possibly to be turned in to concubine.
If there was any hope for dealing decisively with the bandits and their ISWAP collaborators, that hope has faded away with the recent statement by the Cheif of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Brutai, saying that only Nigerians can end the war.
How can the military blame a traumatised people that sleep with one eye open, who sometimes pass information to the authorities, but yield less result as most response come only after the bandits are through with their operation.
Also, the disclosure on the BBC Hausa service interview two days ago by the Chairman Senate Committee on the Army that the military is ill-equipped is a major blow to the fight against insurgency.
He said that the Army heieachy told him that not all funds approved is released to them and therefore, gives the insurgents the upper hand in some cases.
I hope that the presidency will lay its hands on the transscripts of the entire BBC interview or invite the Senate Committee Chairman on Army to brief them and even collaborate on how to make sure that pending and request for future financial releases to the military is treated with utmost urgency.
It makes a mockery of the President’s efforts who append his signature and only for some bureaucratic forces to downplay the importance of the release of the funds. No wonder about 350 servicemen have recently resigned.
May be it is time for the North to go spiritual in full gear. Let us invoke the intervention of the Almighty God. He is ever listening and ever knowing.
Aminu Iyawa is Nigeria’s former Ambassador to Mexico
