BY Emmanuel Onwubiko
There are two different issues that have just cropped up
in the public domain and have constituted the discussion points for most
commentators observing the trajectories of the Counter terror war being waged
by the Armed forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I must say that
everyone who is somebody in the World of scholarship is involved in the
observation of the goings on in the war on terror in the North East of
Nigeria.
These two issues are the just announced national
training exercises by the Nigerian Army to cover all parts of Nigeria and
secondly but not the least is the talking point on the statement credited to
the Nigeria's Army Chief Lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai that combats
are not enough to overcome the terror threats in Nigeria but that there is the
essential element of the spiritual dimension or what I have chosen to call the
'Spiritual warfare'.
Beginning from the angle of the arguments and debates
that are beginning to dominate the social media space which is the issue of the
need for a Spiritual dimension to the fight on terror, I will state
categorically that the statement by the Army Chief has been misinterpreted and
misunderstood by some of these prominent commentators and agenda setters who
have unleashed a wave of criticisms condemning the statement and painting a
graphic picture of a military chief who no longer has any winning strategy to
combat once and for a the terrible but formidable threats that armed boko Haram
terrorists pose to the corporate existence of Nigeria.
This misinterpretation could have been avoided if those
making the remarks had taking their time to read through the published speech
made by the Army Chief and if these observers have found the intellectual
presence of mind to just conduct just three hours research on the thematic area
of what in the West is termed Islamic terrorism.
Before I delve into citations of authorities to show
that what the Army Chief of Staff said is the correct statement of facts all
over the contemporary World, I will state straightaway that there can be no
terrorism without distorted religious and ideological belief system spread by
some radicalized elements found in almost all religious groups and
nationalities.
So, I admit that terrorism is not an exclusive preserve
of bad MOSLEMS but even White Supremacists who have on many occasions engaged
in mass shootings in New Zealand, USA and Australia are not MOSLEMS.
The best way forward as a strategy for winning the
hearts and minds of the people of the territorial space whereby the war on
terror is waged, is to accept the reality that it will take intensive Spiritual
and theological reorientation by the real and genuine scholars of Islam for
instance who should normally be expected and requested to play significant
roles to change the wrong mindset of the younger elements who are rapidly been
radicalized and wrongly indoctrinated by the hierarchy of the boko Haram
terrorists.
I will return to this point and back it up with
contemporary but profound research findings. Terrorism is a very developing specialty
with trailer load of scholarly works developed or about to be fully developed.
By the last count, I have read about two dozen newly published academic
findings on the different dimensions of the global war on terror which intensified
since September 11th 2001 when the World saw the coordinated attacks by the
Islamic terrorists group al-Qaeda against the United States of America on the
morning of Tuesday September 11th 2001 which snowballed into a global incident
since out of the well over 3,000 casualties, virtually every continent of the
World lost their members.
But first let me remind these critics who I must admit
mean well for Nigeria that the Chief of Army Staff did not call for the
abdication of combats by the professional soldiers neither did he advocate
that the soldiers who are fighting in the war fronts or flashpoints of war on
terror should abandon their professional callings to embrace spiritual
exercises in Churches and Mosques. Far from it.
Rather, the Chief of Army Staff, Lt General Tukur Yusuf
Buratai, said that terrorism and terrorist groups could not be eliminated alone
by the military unless religious bodies and organizations in the country come
to the “forefront of this spiritual battle.”
The army chief noted that the focus must be religious
groups interfacing on addressing the ideologies which fuelled the Boko Haram
and ISWAP terrorists.
Buratai stated these on Monday in Abuja at a spiritual
warfare seminar at the Nigerian Army Resource Centre with the theme,
“countering insurgency and violent extremism in Nigeria through spiritual
warfare.”
The army chief, who was represented by the Chief of
Administration, Maj Gen Sani Yusuf, therefore, urges Islamic and Christian
clerics across the army formations to join the fight against terrorism, and
reorient the people against negative ideologies.
Buratai said, “It is easier to defeat Boko Haram and
ISWAP terrorists than their ideology because while we degrade the terrorists
and their havens, the narrative of the ideology grows the group.
“Therefore, communities, families, and groups should
join in the fight and narratives to reject and prevent the ideologies of the
terrorists and extremist groups.
“Religious bodies and organizations in particular who
interfaces regularly with the grassroots should be at the forefront of this
spiritual battle and fashion out ways of stepping up their roles.
“The fight against terrorism, Boko Haram and ISWAP, as
well as other security threats, cannot be left to the troops in the battlefield
alone. Yes, we will do our duties but the need to tackle groups through
spiritual warfare and re-orientating the followers against the ideology is also
a necessity.
“It is a well-known fact that terrorism and terrorist
groups cannot be totally eliminated by mainly military actions. This means
focusing our efforts on the underlying narratives through ideologies that are
employed by these terrorists to lure innocent citizens to their fold.
“The need to defeat the ideologies of Boko Haram and
ISWAP is based on the awareness that it is the ideologies that enhance their
resources and help to recruit new fighters to their fold and as such; kill
their ideology and the terrorist movement withers
The army chief added that religious leaders and clerics
who regularly interfaced with members of the society must “fashion out ways of
stepping up your roles, remembering that the fight against terrorism is a
collective responsibility.”
At the risk of violating the seeming oath of secrecy
sworn to when I enlisted as a member of a 7 man Presidential Committee on
restoration of Peace and Dialogue in Northern Nigeria which sat for nearly
three years prior to the emergence of the current administration, I will tell
my readers that top Islamic clerics were part of that committee and their
specific roles was to deploy their intellectual wherewithal and their iconic
Islamic trainings to re-orientate members of boko haram terrorists whom we met
in different undisclosed detention facilities all across Nigeria with the aim
of deradicalizing them and reintegrating them through methodical reorientation
to once more embrace constructive coexistence with divergent groups of people
in the larger communities.
So Lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai was much more
than 100% correct to affirm that the war on terror can't be conclusively and
decisively won through physical means without activating the spiritual
mechanisms and dimension.
Now let me quote the experts to back up my affirmations
aforementioned.
In the scholarly article titled "Towards a
definition of terrorist ideology by Gary A. Ackerman and Michael Burnham these
versatile scholars and intellectuals reached a determination that to defeat
terrorism you need to have a total appreciation of the underlying spiritual
ideology governing these whole ranges of armed terrorists.
They wrote thus: "While conventional wisdom holds
that the ideology espoused by a terrorist organization is somehow related to
that organization’s actions, the precise nature of the relationship between
these phenomena is hotly debated, with scholarship often yielding contrasting
empirical results."
Reminding us that we argue that one reason for this
divergence in viewpoints and research findings is an inadequate understanding
of what ideology actually is and how it relates to terrorism, but restated
their deep conviction that it is the case as it were.
Indeed, these authors revealed that terrorism literature
reveals widely disparate uses of the concept of terrorist ideology.
In this aforementioned article the writers endeavor to
provide a common framework for approaching ideology in the context of terrorism
studies by systematically building a new definition of terrorist ideology from
first principles.
In so doing, they introduce a definition of terrorist
ideology that is logically consistent, has robust theoretical underpinnings,
and connects the study of ideology within terrorism to broader disciplinary
research traditions regarding ideology.
This style they stated provides a conceptual foundation
from which to examine terrorist ideology in an objective, systematic manner and
thereby enables terrorism researchers to more productively investigate
important outstanding questions, such as which aspects of an ideology are most
relevant to violent behavior.
Another study on the online caliphate: internet usage
and ISIS support in Arab World, James A. Piaza and Ahmet Guler who are experts
argued that the internet has provided expanded opportunities for violent
extremist groups to propagandize and recruit.
"The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, is
an exemplar in that it has heavily invested in an online presence and uses
online communities and social media to attract and retain supporters. Does
ISIS’s online presence translate into a higher probability that individuals in
its target audience will become supporters? In this study we analyze over 6,000
individuals in six Arab countries to find if those that use the internet to
follow political news or to express political views are more likely to support
ISIS".
The researchers states that: "We find that
respondents who get their news online are significantly more likely to support
ISIS than those who follow the news on television or print media. Moreover,
those who use online for a political expression are also more likely to express
support for ISIS."
Indeed, they reasoned that individuals who engage in
online political discussion are more likely to support ISIS than those who
engage in conventional political activity, though less than those who engage in
contentious political behaviors such as attending a political protest. We
conclude with a brief discussion of the academic and policy implications of
these findings.
On the fears that the forthcoming national combat
exercises by the Nigerian Army will infringe on human rights if one of the
components is to restrict freedom of movements enshrined in the Constitution by
way of demanding identification, I need to say that ad a human rights
campaigner with deep interests in the internal security operations in the
Country, we have received assurances that citizen's human rights will not be
wantonly violated since the Nigerian Army as a constitutionally created agency
must comply with chapter 4 of the Nigerian Constitution and as I write the
Chief of Army Staff Lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai has written and
distributed a GREEN BOOK containing law based guidelines on protection of human
rights of all citizens by the military during combat and non-combat internal
operations. I have a copy of this book and I must state that the contents are
so rich that Nigerians need not worry that the military will harass intimidate
or abuse their human rights with reckless abandon. Moreover, accredited human
rights groups will be on ground to observe the operations just as the Nigerian
Army has a functional full-fledged department of civil and military relations
with vibrant human rights desks in all segments of the Army presence
nationwide.
*Emmanuel Onwubiko heads Human Rights Writers
Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) and blogs @www.emmanuelonwubiko.com; www
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