by Renie Anjeh
Over the last fortnight, the international community has shown tremendous solidarity with the people of France after the horrendous terrorist attacks in Paris. Millions from across the world, from all faiths and none, took the streets in defiance of vile terrorists, in order to defend values that we hold dear – freedom, democracy, equality, rule of law. In our country, it has sparked a national debate about freedom of speech, liberty and security and the role of religion. If anything is clear from the last week or so, it is that the perpetrators of this disgusting attack on freedom have failed.
However, while the eyes of the world has been focused on France, little attention has been paid to atrocities that are taking place in Nigeria.
But first, let’s go back to last April. 276 schoolgirls, studying at a school in Borno State in north Nigeria, were kidnapped by Boko Haram, and as news of the abduction spread, awareness of this terrorist group grew. The Twitterati took to their smartphones to calling on Boko Haram to #BringBackOurGirls.
Celebrities with melancholic faces held placards calling on Boko Haram to do just that. Our Prime Minister David Cameron and the First Lady Michelle Obama also joined in, demonstrating their anger at the terrorist group. Goodluck Jonathan, the criminally ineffective President of Nigeria, called Boko Haram to release the girls but blamed the parents of the girls who were kidnapped. But did Boko Haram ‘bring back our girls’? No. And the world forgot.
Now in January 2015, Boko Haram have killed 2,000 people in one single attack. Sixteen towns and villages in northeast Nigeria have been burnt to the ground. Almost 4,000 homes have been destroyed. Girls as young as 10, have been used by Boko Haram as ‘suicide bombers’, killing at least 23 people. 20,000 have fled their homes, with the majority seeking refuge in neighbouring Chad. As a result, Boko Haram now control 70% of Borno State, in northern Nigeria.
While it is true that Boko Haram is strong in Nigeria, they are also active in Cameroon, Niger and Chad. In Cameroon, airstrikes have been launched against Boko Haram and this week Boko Haram kidnapped 80 Cameroonians (50 of which were children) but their problems with Boko Haram are not new.
Last year, they attacked the region of Tourou in north Cameroon and even abducted the wife of the Cameroonian vice-president. Now Boko Haram control an area the size of Costa Rica and Slovakia, and they will stop at nothing until they will stop at nothing until they establish an Islamic caliphate in West Africa.
Paul Biya, the President of Cameroon, has called for assistance from the international community. His calls have been supported by Ignatius Kaigama, the Archbishop of Jos, in central Nigeria, who said that the world must show more determination to halt Boko Haram’s advance. They are right and we should heed their advice.
This is a classic case of ‘responsibility to protect’ and the world must start taking the threat of Boko Haram by showing the same resolve that it showed during the attacks in Paris. If it is right that world is carrying out action against ISIS in Iraq (which I believe it is), why not act against the new ISIS in Nigeria? There will undoubtedly be a coalition of Ukippers and lef-twing neo-isolationists who will argue that it is our proclivity for foreign intervention that has caused the rise of Boko Haram and ISIS but this argument elides the fact 9/11 took place before intervention in Afghanistan and that Nigeria has not experienced Western intervention but still faces the rise of Islamist terrorist group.
It has been said that Phillip Hammond and John Kerry have an initiative to deal with Boko Haram but they have not elaborated on any details. That is not good enough especially seeing as Russia (yes, Russia) have agreed to supply the Cameroonian army with more sophisticated and modern weaponry.
David Cameron should encourage his “bro”, Barack Obama, to act on this issue. He should be on the phone to Goodluck Jonathan asking him to put his election campaign aside and focus on supporting his own people. Parliament should debate this just as it debated the conflict in Iraq and Syria.
Also, there is a challenge for Labour. If Ed Miliband becomes Prime Minister in May, which I hope he does, he must not give succour to the hard left in our party but do the right thing and show solidarity with the people of Nigeria, Chad and Cameroon.
Britain has a choice: either we can follow the path set by the Farageists and pull up the drawbridge even when people around the world need our help or we can continue to uphold the great British tradition of internationalism and openness. I know which choice I’d make!
Je suis Charlie, mais n’oublions pas les victimes de Boko Haram.
Renie Anjeh is a Labour party activist
Tags: #bringbackourgirls, Boko Haran, Goodluck Jonatha, islamism, Nigeria, Renie Anjeh
Why is it a ‘western’ problem when the local forces are incapable of doing anything and the kleptocracy of their governments persists. This is an African problem therefore requires an African solution, they wanted the old colonial powers out, so therefore they reap what they sowed.
Fight with what? The entire armed forces was restructured and re-equipped to fight in wide open arid terrains (Iraq and Afghanistan). We don’t have the equipment to launch a ground campaign in a tropical/jungle environment – especially infantry, as that sort of war is predominantly heavily infantry (and on foot, the old fashioned way) because of the terrain and environment.
That’s the problem with a small army – you end up superbly equipped to fight your last war.
Well said Renie. I find it very disheartening that since the fallout from the Iraq war it has become typical for many Labour activists to advocate that we should not involve ourselves in pretty much any foreign intervention at all, effectively meaning that we turn our back on this kind of suffering.
I fail to understand why people who advocate that kind of inaction always seem to behave like they hold the moral high ground. Labour needs to rediscover its principles of international solidarity with those who are being oppressed by violent fascist ideologies, wherever they are in the world.
How about that disgrace of a President Goodluck J acting on Boko Haram instead?
So far no Westerners have been killed or abducted (unlike the policy of the disgraceful ISIS and Al Quaida). Howabout cutting off all aid to Nigeria until the get their fingers out and do something about their own Islamofacists. Sanctions and Boycotts please. Or leave them to stew. We have our own Islamofacists to contend with here in Britain.
“he [Miliband] must not give succour to the hard left”
Quite right.
Let’s be honest, military intervention has almost become an unmentionable in our Party.
But this is no excuse for shying away from our responsibilities to the world. Yes, Iraq wasn’t an unqualified success, but we did help get rid of a dictator. The same goes for Libya.
And importantly, the oil is still flowing.
Then there is Miliband’s disgrace: he argued for a punitive strike against Assad but attempted to take credit for a peace dividend when Cameron threw the towel in. Utterly shameful.
No matter that our intervention would have required an alliance with the islamofacists – they were, after all, the only ground force available.
No matter that Assad’s army is now battling Isis along with the Kurds, some of whom were previously accorded terrorist status. Quite simply, we should have gone in and pushed on to Tehran, solving the Middle East’s problems in one decisive, master-stroke.
Liberty, fertilised by countless corpses, would then blossom amid the ruins.
dwll
“Well said Renie. I find it very disheartening that since the fallout from the Iraq war it has become typical for many Labour activists to advocate that we should not involve ourselves in pretty much any foreign intervention at all, effectively meaning that we turn our back on this kind of suffering.
I fail to understand why people who advocate that kind of inaction always seem to behave like they hold the moral high ground. Labour needs to rediscover its principles of international solidarity with those who are being oppressed by violent fascist ideologies, wherever they are in the world.”
Several comments, The first being are you or any of your family willing to be in the first unit to deploy to such an environment and close and kill the enemy. two, who is going to fund such expeditionary action. Three, are you going to inform next of kin of anyone of HM forces when they are killed in action or are taken prisoner and raped or behead on film. fourth, who is going to pay????
No, thought not, but it so easy to be a keyboard warrior and want to send other peoples children to war.
This is an African problem not a western one. they have the resources in the terms of cash to deal with this.
Great idea, let’s have a foreign war against an enemy operating asymmetrically in a nation, the population which will inevitably have a thoroughly ambivalent attitude to our presence and the military of which appears to have been hollowed out from a competent force to a crowd of cowardly ragamuffins through corruption and neglect.
Perhaps we could do it without any clear political idea of what we hope to achieve and, ideally, with the purse string really tightly held.
What could possibly go wrong?
I’ve got a feeling that the only solution to taking on ISIS is to raise a Mercenary Army, very similar to the UN Forces, but not under the aegsis of any Nation or International Agency.
The Mercenary Army will of course be well paid by interestred Nations, but discretely, very discretely. That way, no recriminations, no come backs, and no tears shed.
it will consist of mainly young men seeking adventure as well as of course a goal in life: to defeat a savage enemy. And the tactics it uses will of course not be hands-tied by the Geneva Conventions, so it will be able to take on ISIS and Al Quiada will brutal strength and response; like for like. Its something that ISIS might well learn to respect and fear, because that is the only language they iunderstand.
Bob,
I don’t seem to remember calling for British troops on the ground in Nigeria. The point is that if the international community can show resolve in dealing with ISIS, through airstrikes and other support for the Iraqi army and the Kurds then we should also be doing more to develop a strategic approach to defeating Boko Haram, preferably an approach that is Nigerian-led but internationally supported.
But the lack of attention or urgency in getting to grips with the situation is shameful. And the left joins Nigel Farage in shrugging their shoulders and saying “nothing to do with us”.
dwll says:
“I don’t seem to remember calling for British troops on the ground in Nigeria. The point is that if the international community can show resolve in dealing with ISIS, through airstrikes and other support for the Iraqi army and the Kurds then we should also be doing more to develop a strategic approach to defeating Boko Haram, preferably an approach that is Nigerian-led but internationally supported.
But the lack of attention or urgency in getting to grips with the situation is shameful. And the left joins Nigel Farage in shrugging their shoulders and saying “nothing to do with us”.”
The so called ‘international community’ cannot find its own backside with both hands. Any military action requires deployment and that requires secure bases, force protection, a long logistics chain and most importantly money to fund it. The only way to deal with this situation is troops on the ground due to the Nigerian army being incompetent and poorly led. That situation leads to a force who will be legally hamstrung as the actions to deal with these people will have to be swift violent and leaving no prisoners.
This is an African problem which requires an African solution. The countries in Africa were only too quick to break away from colonialism, therefore they reap as they sow.
I don’t seem to remember calling for British troops on the ground in Nigeria.
Nigeria is largely jungle/forest. Smart weaponry and stand-off air attacks lack the impact they have in wide open areas such as Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan. Nigeria’s terrain means an infantry heavy operation with a lot of support helicopters (as opposed to gunships) and heli-liftable light artillery. Long range foot patrols, ambushes, booby-trapping. And that sort of activity necessitates not wearing body armour or helmets – so the casualty rate is higher, the survivability of wounded lower.
It requires an army with soldiers willing to carry large loads over long distances on foot and above all take the fight to the enemy face-to-face – something lacking in the Nigerian Army.
Tafia, read your comment, in my view, a totally correct appreciation of the situation.