Reminiscent of
the abduction of 276 Chibok Girls four years ago, Boko Haram Terrorists (BHT)
on Monday, 19 February 2018, invaded Government Girls Science and Technical
College, (GGSTC), (formerly Government Girls Secondary School, GGSS), Dapchi, Bursari
Local Government Area of Yobe State, Northeast Nigeria. Dapchi, a dusty,
agrarian community sits approximately 100km from Damaturu, the Yobe state
capital. Locals affirmed that the insurgents were dressed in military fatigues
and turbans, that they moved into the
town at about 6pm with about eight Hilux Vans and some Tata trucks bearing
Arabic inscriptions. They were unchallenged, firing automatic
weapons sporadically and shouting ‘’Allahu Akbar’’, meaning God is the
greatest. The kamikaze gunmen
were tenably strangers given that they did not know the location of the girls’ school - GGSTC even though it is just by
the road leading to Gashua town. Not knowing their way around, the Kanuri
speaking gunmen eventually forced some residents to show them the location of
the school. They shook hands with some natives and asked them to proceed with
their prayers, that they are not there for them. After abducting scores of
girls, they headed east, towards Gumsa village. Open source
intelligence suggests that half of the abducted Dapchi
schoolgirls may have been ferried
across the border into neighboring Niger Republic.
Characteristic
of the belated, reactive approach to security in Nigeria by the security
agencies, soldiers reportedly arrived Dapchi two hours after the attack and did
not give the assailants any pursuit. Recall that this is not the first time
Boko Haram will attack a school in Yobe state. Four years ago, precisely on February
25, 2014, Boko Haram Terrorists attacked Federal Government College, Buni Yadi,
Yobe State and slaughtered about 59 secondary school boys. Also recall that on
November 24, 2014, Boko Haram abducted about five
hundred children from Damasak while in another incident, scores of children
were burnt
to death on the outskirts of Maiduguri. The United
Nations Children’s Funds, UNCEF, asserts that
about 1,400 schools (57% of them in Borno) have been shut down, 3 million children
are in need of emergency education support and over 2,000 school teachers have
lost their lives to the Boko Haram insurgency.
Tantamount to a déjà vu, the tepid
response that heralded the Chibok Schoolgirls abduction also played out in the
case of the Dapchi Schoolgirls. If the Jonathan government’s initial skepticism
and lukewarm approach is condoned on the grounds that such an incident was
unprecedented, the Buhari administration’s initial denial cannot be exempted because
there’s a precedent. Nigeria’s reticent president is yet to address the nation
on the Dapchi Schoolgirls abduction. It was five days after the incident, on
Friday, 24 February that one of his spin doctors, Mr. Garba Shehu issued a
press statement on behalf of his boss. The Nigerian
military reportedly
claimed it rescued some of the abducted Dapchi schoolgirls but their claims
turned out to be a fallacy. Seven days after
dragging its heels, the Buhari administration finally confirms the abduction of 110 schoolgirls
from Dapchi, Yobe state. Typical of the Nigerian establishment’s penchant for
administering medicine after death, five days after the Dapchi schoolgirls’
abduction, the Nigerian government on February 25, 2018, ordered the police and the Nigerian
Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, to deploy their personnel to schools
in Yobe state. What for?
The Bring Back Our Girls
Group (BBOG) alleges that the Buhari government is intimidating and muzzling parents of #DapchiGirls into silence. This is disgusting! A
Nigerian journalist knowledgeable about Boko Haram and reputed to have access
to the Sect’s leadership, Ahmad Salkida agrees that no lessons were learnt from
previous incidents. In a tweet, Mr. Salkida submits, ‘’what has been learned from the past, absolutely zero. We
have an over-bloated system that still banks on a colonial structure. The
system is arrogant, ignorant, disconnected and lacks the ability to adapt. The
insurgents are familiar with this and have leveraged on it’’. In so-called
"saner" climes, heads will roll; people vested with the
responsibility of protecting citizens would have been fired or personally
resigned as a result of this embarrassing mass abduction throwback. According
to New York Post, the Sheriff’s officer who did ‘nothing’ to stop the active
shooter in Florida, United States of America, resigned
thereafter.
Matters Arising
The Dapchi
schoolgirls’ abduction debacle prompts more question than answers. The Governor
of Yobe State, Ibrahim Gaidam blames the abduction of the Dapchi schoolgirls on the unexpected ‘’withdrawal
of security personnel from communities in the state’’.
The governor alleges that ‘’security check points
were withdrawn from Dapchi and other communities, few days before the attack’’.
Was it a coincidence that Boko Haram Terrorists invaded Dapchi community
shortly after the purported withdrawal of soldiers from that community? Nigerians
will like to know if there was a risk assessment, who ordered the withdrawal of
soldiers and dismantling of security check-points in Dapchi and other
neighboring communities. Possibly an insider tipped off Boko Haram Terrorists
about the prospect of troop’s withdrawal?
Now that military
authorities are in denial that troops were withdrawn, isn’t it dereliction of
duty that the soldiers didn’t confront or chase after the assailants? If
soldiers were on ground, Boko Haram wouldn’t have had a free rein. If troops
were on ground, they were certainly not within the school’s vicinity or roads leading
to/out of Dapchi town. Also means a rapid response squad was absent. I think
there’s some disconnect in the military’s claims. Moving on…
Where was Nigeria’s
much touted Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, ISR-capable Unmanned
Aerial Vehicle, the ‘’TSAIGUMI’’ - reportedly manufactured by the Nigerian Air
force (NAF)? Apart from the aforesaid drone, Nigeria is said to have the following
air assets with night vision capabilities - Alenia ATR-42-500MPA Surveyor, the Beechcraft
Super King Air 350i and Diamond Sensing DA42 MPP in its inventory. Why did
military authorities not scramble the aforesaid aircrafts immediately the
Dapchi girls were reported missing? Dr. Freedom C. Onuoha of the National Defence College, now with University of Nigeria
Nsukka, submits in a tweet that, ‘’the 'disaster' in the #DapchiGirls is not in
the occurrence but in the response. The question is where were the air assets
that were supposed to be deployed for ISR operation immediately to avoid [a
repeat of the] #ChibokGirls incident?
Just
wondering... please where do Boko Haram Terrorists keep the scores, hundreds of
people they abduct? Do they have underground bunkers or do they ship them to
planet Mars with Elon Musk’s SpaceX? Recall that more than a hundred abducted Chibok Schoolgirls
are still under Boko Haram’s custody nearly four years after they were
abducted. Is it rocket science to glean actionable intelligence from the freed
Chibok Girls regarding inter-alia, the modus operandi of Boko Haram and where
they were ensconced?
Amnesty, Penchant For Paying Ransoms To Terrorists Prompted Dapchi
Girls Abduction
While the
Nigerian government is bent on freeing Boko Haram Terrorists under various
guises – prisoner swap deals, wishy-washy deradicalization program, lack of
evidence, the Sect is unfazed, resilient. The offshoot of the ‘famed’ negotiation
between Boko Haram and the Nigerian government was the swapping of 84 abducted
Chibok schoolgirls with five detained senior Boko Haram commanders and
reportedly, payment of a humongous two million Euros ransom to
the Islamic Sect. Similarly, we hear a quid pro quo, payment
of ransom facilitated the recent freeing of University of Maiduguri
lecturers and some women abducted by a faction of Boko Haram. What do you
expect when a government (in)advertently becomes the chief financier of an
unremorseful band of terrorists? Boko Haram have essentially trialed the efficacy
and mastered the art of kidnap for ransom as a bargaining chip and
manipulation. They give with one hand (release some Chibok schoolgirls) and
take (Dapchi schoolgirls) with the other hand. Discerning minds are not
surprised with Boko Haram’s relapse. My analysis published September 22, 2016: ‘’Recidivism; Unintended Consequences of ‘Amnesty’ To Boko Haram Insurgents, Militants
And Chibok Girls Swop’’ and ‘’Terrorist Recidivism: Rethinking the Carte Blanche Amnesty to
Boko Haram Terrorists’’ published February 7, 2018 forecasted the turn out of events. This vicious cycle, kidnap for ransom and extortion, KRE, will likely
persist in the foreseeable future.
Conclusion:
Many out there,
not just Nigerians are ashamed of this Dapchi schoolgirls’ abduction miasma. To
paraphrase CNN’s Isha Sesay’s assertion, Buhari calling the Dapchi schoolgirls
abduction a national disaster is an understatement, it is a PROFOUND national disgrace. It follows that no lessons were learnt and no measures were
put in place aftermath of the Chibok schoolgirls’ abduction to forestall
recurrence. It smacks of profound intelligence
failure that Boko Haram Terrorists will ‘’disappear’’ hundreds of people from
the face of planet earth, without Nigerian security and intelligence agencies
having no iota of clue as to where these Nigerians are holed up. Imagine the
man hour, logistics and resources involved in planning, abducting hundreds of
people, transporting, housing/feeding and clothing them. It is not a mean feat.
This explains why doubting Thomases dispute the plausibility of the Chibok
Schoolgirls abduction till date. I may be forced to concede that Boko Haram
Terrorists are after all a step ahead of the Nigerian security/intelligence agencies.
The Chibok and Dapchi schoolgirls’ abduction debacle attests inter-alia that
(a) The Nigerian government albeit been a signatory to the Safe School
Declaration/Initiative, have failed to ensure that schools in northeast Nigeria are safe
and conducive for learning (b) Contrary to the trite
spin by the Nigerian government and the military, Boko Haram is still very much
a threat, have not been defeated, technically or otherwise (c) Nigeria is
struggling to hold on to swathes of grounds it seized back from Boko Haram (d)
There are ungoverned spaces in Nigeria (e) Nigeria is systematically exhibiting symptoms of a failing or failed
state. Explains why the Fund For Peace (FFP), a Washington DC-based organization,
for the second time in a row, ranks Nigeria thirteenth
least stable country in the world out of 177 nations appraised in the 2017
Fragile State Index (FSI).
The least Nigerians expect
is that some people up there in the security echelon should take responsibility
for this massive international embarrassment, security, intelligence failure
and do the needful – throw in the towel – or be sacked. By the way, Boko Haram
Terrorist group have metamorphosed into a political game changer. The Chibok
schoolgirls’ abduction was one of Goodluck Jonathan’s undoing; contributed to
his unsuccessful reelection bid. Buhari is in tow.
Written
by:
© Don Okereke, a security consultant/analyst, writer
Follow me on Twitter:
@DonOkereke
February
26, 2018
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