The emergence of Boko Haram can be traced back to 2002, it was founded by Muhammed Yusuf with the name Jamāʿat Ahl al-Sunnah li-l-Daʿawah wa al-Jihād which can be loosely translated as “People Committed to the Prophet’s Teachings for Propagation and Jihad”. Initially, the group activities were unknown to Nigerians as it was relatively peaceful, not until 2009 which has seen increase in the notoriety of the group through senseless assassinations of innocent Nigerians in northeastern part of the country.
Boko Haram terrorist organizations, at its summit in 2014 – 2015, was the second largest terror group in the world, only behind ISIS with about 35,000 fighters. The Jihadi group occupied and controlled the land area the size of Belgium.
The military is doing a very good job, trying to curtail the menace of one of the world largest and deadliest terrorist organizations despite limited resources. In spite of this, large percentage of Nigerians have no personal experience of a menace that is threatening the existence of the country.
Many Nigerians are doubting the sincerity of both the government and the military. However, there are some factors hindering the war against terror, which are oblivious to Nigerians.
As many observers has rightly pointed out, the group obviously has a foreign sponsors that are hell bent to see the disintegration of Nigeria. For example, the majority of the captured fighters of the sect spoke creole version of French, which made it obvious that the sects recruited most of it fighters from neighboring former France colonies.
There were series of events in 2014/2015 that corroborated the above assumption of foreign sponsors of the sect, one notable event was the time when Nigeria armed forces were on the offensive. They were on the verge of annihilating the sect, a demoralized Boko Haram was giving respite from absolute annihilation a week before final offensive, when France through the deceased former president of Chad, Idriss Deby, brokered a scam in the name of ceasefire deal. Deby convinced the Nigeria government to cancel the offensive against the high ranking military officers of Nigeria. It is too little too late before Nigeria discovered that it was nothing but a ploy to buy the sect some time to recover because immediately after the call Idris Deby went into hiding.
Just little time after the aforementioned incident, Baharat Gnoti, senior aide to Deby was caught by Nigeria border guards with 22 SA-7 SAMs. Where was he taking it to? He was to deliver it to Boko Haram sect, with the sect claiming they have received $3 million from France in the form of ransom, which included Cameroon, another former France colony to release five top Boko Haram commanders in their custody.
In Syria, it took coalition of over 62 nations to defeat Islamic State. But here in Nigeria, it was the polar opposite. The war against the insurgents is being fought single-handedly by Nigeria, while the leaders of the world most powerful nations are only blocking Nigeria from acquiring advanced military hardwares needed to finally end the insurgence, and this saw an attempt by Nigeria to acquire AH-1 Viper helicopters blocked over frivolous excuse of human rights violations. Why is Nigeria left alone to fight the jihadist? It all reeks of hypocrisy, eye-service and conspiracy from the western powers.
What Nigeria need right now like I always posit, is the urgent need by Nigeria to be wary of western powers, especially France and her former colonies in northern borders. There is deliberate attempt by them to undermine Nigeria’s effort to end the insurgents by any possible way. It is only right for Nigeria to devise a means to thwart the conspiracy so as protect the sovereignty of the nation.
