The Verdict according to Olusegun Adeniyi, Email: olusegun.adeniyi@thisdaylive.com
If you have not heard the name Mohamed Warsama before, it only means that you have not yet been playing in the big league of the Nigerian internet community. For the uninitiated, Warsama is a Kenyan who has managed to wangle his way into several Nigerian blogs and listserv, especially those operated by our compatriots in the Diaspora.
Given the hate messages and stereotypes along ethno-religious lines that pass around, the personal abuses and insults hurled at one another, the labels put on those with whom we disagree and the tales of scandals that abound in our public arena, Warsama has quite naturally seen our nakedness as a nation and has clearly formed his opinion about us as a people. For that reason, the Kenyan delights in winding Nigerians and using every opportunity to take potshots at our country. Yet while his interventions could be mischievous, even diabolical, there are times when you cannot but sense genuine affection for, and concern about, our country.
Three weeks ago, Warsama posted a one-paragraph message which apparently was (as usual) meant to needle Nigerians but may in fact be helpful in understanding our current travails. He wrote: “Last Friday, the Kenyan newspaper, The Standard, had a page three article on 12 chimpanzees at the Sweetwaters Sanctuary in Laikipia. Title of the article: ‘Unity of purpose: Amazing lessons from chimpanzees on pulling together’. Our chimpanzees are educated and intelligent enough to work together as a team. In Nigeria and Cameroun, they eat their chimpanzees. Considering the deplorable noisy quarrels on Nigerian blogs, I believe it is high time for Nigerians to ape our chimps and start pulling together.”
That Nigeria is today a divided country is self-evident, what with the misdirected anger and mutual recriminations. Yet when a people can no longer engage in meaningful conversations about their country without imputation of motives and mutual suspicion, there is a serious challenge as it would be difficult to resolve common problems. It is then little wonder that Boko Haram has almost carved an empire for itself in the Northeast of Nigeria with hundreds of innocent lives lost and countless others physically and psychologically maimed for the rest of their lives.
As a way of addressing the problem, the Sultan of Sokoto, His Eminence Sa’ad Abubakar recently suggested the idea of amnesty. However, rather than the federal government quietly inviting the Sultan for a discussion on how such could be achieved, since amnesty is a process and not an event, President Goodluck Jonathan went public to dismiss the idea in the course of a visit to Borno and Yobe States, the epicentre of Boko Haram violent operations, on the pretext that amnesty cannot be granted to “ghosts”.
What that unfortunate declaration did was to open another floodgate of ill-digested agitations. Since we always assume that two wrongs make a right, many prominent people from the North have jumped into the fray to make it appear as if the only solution to the problem is amnesty. So with both sides politicising the Sultan’s patriotic proposition for addressing a perplexing national challenge, the atmosphere has now been fouled by nothing but crass opportunism.
However, the bottom-line remains that the federal government is mismanaging the situation. The Sultan is a deep and reticent man who weighs his words very carefully and I fail to understand why his well-meaning intervention should get the response it did given that he was only reading from the script already written by Aso Rock. It is recalled that on August 2, 2011, the federal government inaugurated a Presidential Committee on the security challenges in the North-East zone with Amb. Usman Galtimari as chairman. Other members of the committee included Senator Mohammed Ndume, Chief Joe-Kyari Gadzama, (SAN) and three serving ministers: Dr Bello H. Mohammed, Mr Bala Mohammed and Mr Emeka Wogu.
Following the submission of their report, the federal government then set up a white paper committee headed by Interior Minister, Comrade Abba Moro who came up with the recommendations on which the positions of government were then clearly stated in May 2012, almost one year ago! Instructively, the preamble to the government position reads: “The white paper committee wishes to underscore the presidential committee’s recommendation for a prompt implementation of the report. The timely implementation will inevitably serve as lasting solution to the security challenge thrown up by the Boko Haram sect.”
For inexplicable reasons, the federal government has refused to heed its own counsel, even on the recommendations it actually accepted for implementation. Here is a quote from the white paper which may help our perspective on the issue of amnesty: "The Committee recommended the urgent need to constructively engage and dialogue with the leadership of the sect as an essential strategy in bringing them on board. However, it advised that government should negotiate from a position of strength by allowing security forces dominate the environment. In addition, dialogue with the sect should be contingent upon their renunciation of violence and arms. Government accepts this recommendation and encourages the intermediaries who have access to them to initiate this dialogue". Then as part of the long term measures, government also accepted the “rehabilitation of arrested members before their integration into the society”.
What the above suggests is that the federal government has since May last year accepted in principle the idea of amnesty as a possible solution to the Boko Haram challenge but has not done anything to move the process forward. That is why the call by the Sultan should not have elicited the reaction it did if there were honesty of purpose. But neither should some prominent Northern stakeholders turn the amnesty proposal into another song and dance or a political “bulala” with which to whip the Jonathan administration. What is ignored in this sabre rattling is that times like this demand sensitivity not only because there are families still hurting from losing loved ones as a result of the violence going on but also because peace cannot be achieved in an environment of acrimony and grandstanding.
In any case, amnesty for Boko Haram alone cannot resolve all the contradictions that engender violence in our country yet the entire atmosphere is now suffused with the politics of 2015 at a critical juncture in our history when we need the intervention of genuine patriots to stand up and be counted. Right now, there are killings between the Enugu-Otu Aguleri and their Ashonwo/Odeke neighbours in Ibaji Local government area of Kogi state over oil wells and only last week, Kaduna State Governor Mukhtar Yero lamented that the living pattern within Kaduna metropolis is now divided along ethno-religious line and it has nothing to do with Boko Haram. According to him, "people can no longer reside wherever they wish for fear of being singled out for attack in times of crisis due to a particular disparity with other residents that are in majority...we cannot work together and share jokes by afternoon and fear to sleep in the same location at night. That is not genuine peace and we cannot continue that way.”
It is within the foregoing context that we should situate the suggestion made by the Sultan to the effect that all options should be on the table if we actually mean to resolve the Boko Haram logjam and I also believe we can borrow from the Niger Delta amnesty template. I, however, disagree with those who compare Boko Haram with the Niger Delta agitation against the despoliation of their land and environment as a result of oil prospecting. They are clearly different issues but those details matter little if what we are looking for is solution to a complicated problem. However, if we must embrace the option of amnesty, it should also be clearly understood that it is a very difficult process. It involves identifying credible intermediaries and honest brokers, it involves the president going out of his way to meet specific people within the Boko Haram rank and file (they have sufficiently proved to be no ghosts), it involves time and painstaking dialogue sessions, even at odd hours and it involves money.
Mr David Edevbie and I took notes for President Yar’Adua in most of his meetings with various stakeholders (including the militant leaders) on Niger Delta amnesty and almost every of such sessions always ended with the two of us being asked out so Yar’Adua could hold one-on-one discussion with whoever he was meeting with. We may not know the details of what was discussed behind closed doors but we had ideas because people don’t just surrender their weapons without some tangibles to fall back on. In any case, it was very telling that despite the chilling security reports on the much-dreaded “Camp 5”, including how soldiers were killed and buried in shallow graves, Chief Government Ekpumopolo aka Tompolo, had easy access to Yar’Adua anytime he wanted to see or speak with him. So involved was the late president that he even brokered a reconciliation meeting between Rivers State Governor, Mr Rotimi Amaechi and militant leader, Mr Ateke Tom, lasting hours. Then Vice President Goodluck Jonathan also took a rather risky expedition to the creeks to discuss with the militant leaders in between travelling to South Africa to meet with Mr Henry Okah. Air Chief Marshall Paul Dike, Major General Godwin Abe (rtd), AVM Lucky Ararile (rtd), Mr Mike Okiro, Mr. Nduka Obaigbena, Chief Mike Aondoakaa, Mr Afakriya Gadzama, Dr. Timiebi Koripamo-Agary, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, Prof. Wole Soyinka, Admiral Mike Aikhigbe, Major General Luke Akpezi (rtd), Mr Amagbe Kentebe, Mr Timi Alaibe, Mr Femi Falana, (SAN), Chief James Ibori, Chief Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, Elder Godsday Orubebe as well as then National Security Adviser, Major General Sarki Mouktah played critical role in the process. I cannot forget to mention Chief Tony Anenih who, at the special request of the late president, took a most dangerous risk of a night trip to Tompolo’s hideout (at a time JTF had taken the battle to his camp and he was on the run), using the contact of a retired police officer whom he personally recruited into the force in the seventies. All these were done because of the desire for peace in the Niger Delta without which there can neither be peace nor prosperity in our country.
What the above suggests is that granting amnesty is not an easy option and even at that it is a gamble that can fail as President Olusegun Obasanjo reminded the late Yar’Adua at the Council of State meeting held shortly before the proclamation of Amnesty for Niger Delta militants was made on June 25, 2009. But it was a gamble worth taking aside the fact that there was also “Option B” coordinated by Dike in collaboration with all then service Chiefs (General Abdulrahman Dambazzau, Rear Admiral Isaiah Iko Ibrahim and Air Vice Marshall Oluseyi Peterin). This is therefore time for President Jonathan to be a statesman by jettisoning the counsel of those around him who see Boko Haram as a “Northern problem”. He should also ignore political opponents who think they can exploit the current tragedy to advance their own career. And to those who may have problems with granting amnesty to Boko Haram, I invite them to read the Easter homily of Bishop Mathew Hassan Kukah on http://premiumtimesng.com/opinion/127773-from-amnesty-to-repentance-by-mathew-hassan-kukah.html.
At a time we need to come together as one, there is no greater evidence that we are gradually losing our country than a most unfortunate line in the tribute paid Prof. Chinua Achebe by our two surviving literary legends, Nobel Laureate, Prof. Soyinka and Prof. John Pepper Clarke. Here they go: “Indeed, we cannot help wondering if the recent insensate massacre of Chinua’s people in Kano, only a few days ago, hastened the fatal undermining of that resilient will that had sustained him so many years after his crippling accident.” Last week, there was an online debate among members of THISDAY editorial board on this statement by the two literary icons. For me, nobody summed up our feeling more brilliantly than Mr Kayode Komolafe who in his own comment (which I reproduce with his permission) wrote: “the violence in parts of the north is a national problem. The over 3, 000 persons reportedly killed in the various incidents were all Achebe's people. Even non-Nigerians amongst the victims belonged to the same humanity with Achebe. The perspective to this problem should not just be vertical; it should also be horizontal. Nigeria is not just the arithmetic sum of Hausa, Ijaw, Igbo, Fulani, Yoruba, Urhobos, etc. Nigeria is actually made of the rich and powerful people from all regions and ethnic groups who are causing the problems and living with the poor everywhere who are always the victims. There has to be a Nigerian solution to the problem.”
In the stage that we are in today, to foreclose amnesty or put the responsibility on Northern leaders to produce Boko Haram leaders is not only disingenuous, it betrays a clear lack of willingness to resolve the problem. It must be very clear to the discerning that the entrepreneurs of violence in our midst understand those nuances and may indeed be selecting their targets in such a manner as to further set us against one another. But it is our responsibility to ensure that they do not win the argument. And we will only do that if, like Warsama’s Kenyan Chimpanzees, we all pull together. But President Jonathan must also lead on the issue. And he can only do that if he sees himself as the President of Nigeria, and not that of a particular section of the country.
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