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Politics, insurgency and battle fronts

Comfort Inyang 218 Comments

It is becoming clear nowadays that democracy and its practice of governance predicated on its ideology of mass participation and majority rule nowadays is testing and taxing both the resources and patience of both the ruler and the ruled in many parts of the world. There are simply too many battle fronts in sorting out issues and so many frayed nerves between governments and those they rule with elected mandate, such that on most occasions looming descent into anarchy or the failed state is always around the corner.

Just look around you in the many states and nations of the world and you see issues collapsing into violence and mistrust and hostilities bursting at their seams. Many of these issues I have called or labeled Insurgency and some battle fronts. But just as former US President Donald Trump earned the eternal enmity of CNN by calling that outfit – fake news – I will show today that there can be real insurgencies and fake ones just as we have real and fake battle fronts too all in the business of contemporary politics and governance of the world’s many governments and democracies
In the midst of all these rancorous politics however, I salute the so called dictatorships of China and Russia for maintain order and stability even though the former US Secretary of State Pompei recently called the Communist Party of China as the most dangerous threat to world peace. Both China and Russia have stood up to the US in terms of diplomacy and regional power and politics and are increasingly more authoritative on world issues. They did this decisively and strategically while the US dissipated energy on sex issues like LGBT rights and Climate Change under Obama for 8 years and the US withdrew into its shell of ‘America first’ for 4 years under Trump. Even with the pandemic both have managed their nations better than the Americans. And now some have called the new Biden presidency, Obama’s third term and is back to square one with the LGBT razzmatazz, Climate Change and the unique basement pandemic style of governance of Joe Biden who has not had a press conference since he was sworn in since Jan20 2021. The Americans have allowed the pandemic to derail their politics and governance totally such that it seems they are starting anew in building their economy and government policies from scratch as if they were the only one the pandemic hit , although they got the morbid and dubious prize of having the highest global deaths from the pandemic. Unfortunately their 2020 election threw up a 50-50 senate which means that the two parties are on tenterhooks in getting legislations passed in the next four years and the ensuing government or democracy is a cat and mouse game which can both be described as both an insurgency for the Republicans and both a battle front and insurgency for majority or dissenting Democrats who break ranks and vote against their government on issues on some occasions. Pragmatically the two parties are on collision course for the next four years and are solidly on a battle front similar to the civil war from which Abe Lincoln fought successfully to save their unity ages ago.

In Nigeria too we have our well known insurgencies and the new ones that have crept up like the Sahel from the desert sending herdsmen down south to look for grass for their cattle and in the process destroying farms which somehow has pitted the North against the south in a fierce war on several battle fronts. Somehow the hostilities crystallised into a food war recently and there was scarcity of meat in the South leading to meeting with government and a truce brokered by the Kogi State Governor Yahaya Bello. Obviously the herdsmen organization stopped transportation of meat to the south and called off their strike after meeting the Chief of Staff to the president with the Kogi State governor. It was reported that the group leading the herdsmen had demanded 4.75bn compensation and I wonder where the government will get such. Also what compensation will be paid to farmers whose crops were destroyed and some killed? Obviously it seems that cattle people have won a pyrrhic victory in both the battle front and insurgency of food security against the south and I really wonder where we go from here. Which really is a clear case of a successful prosecution of a war in which the North has used starvation as a potent weapon of war. You may call this a phony or fake insurgency but the facts are clear and it is clear who the winner is.

In the real terrorist insurgency in the North East where Boko Haram holds sway against the Nigerian Army, the Borno State Governor at the heart of both the insurgency and battle front with Boko Haram reportedly told the Governors’ Forum of the North East that it appears the Federal Government is not interested in ending the insurgency in the area. He therefore proposed bringing in mercenaries and forming a regional security outfit to tackle the challenges of the insurgency. This is a clear case of lack of confidence in both the Nigerian Army and the FGN.

But the governor Professor Babagana Zulum certainly knows what he is saying because he knows the battle front which is his state and has on occasions barely escaped with his life on guided visits to the battle fronts. He cannot be accused of shouting wolf where there is none because the insurgency of Boko Haram is literally holding his state hostage militarily and has destroyed economic activities in Borno State. Both the army and the FGN should bail out the Borno State governor and defeat Boko Haram with our regular Nigerian army. They should not allow mercenaries to defeat an insurgency on Nigeria’s territory as that questions our territorial integrity the protection of which is the constitutional duty of both the army and the FGN.

Bringing in mercenaries will certainly escalate and internationalise both the insurgency and the battle fronts and may separate the NE permanently and inadvertently from the rest of Nigeria That is an avoidable and undesirable prospect that can be nipped in the bud by just defeating Boko Haram as the governor has been advocating incessantly since getting elected as governor of Borno State. We as a nation and a federation once fought a civil war successfully with the slogan ‘Keeping Nigeria one is a task that must be done’. We should send Boko Haram packing with the same slogan and end the nightmare of both the caring governor of Borno State and his beleaguered and long suffering citizens of the state.

Source: The Nation

Comfort Inyang

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