Terrorism and corruption By Nasir Elrufai

By Nasir Ahmad El-Rufai
Unemployment is the primary target of every sensible
nation’s economic policy, but our policy makers seem
quite content trumpeting and celebrating our jobless
growth. Nationally, at least two in every five able-bodied
Nigerians willing and able to work has no job.
Income inequality is another serious problem. According
to the National Bureau of Statistics NBS, in 2010 65% of
Nigeria’s wealth is owned by just 20% of the population.
This effectively means that 80% of the population share
between them only about one third of the nation’s wealth.
This income inequality manifests itself in conspicuous
consumption by a few side by side with abject poverty
experienced by the many.
Income inequality, unemployment and poverty have been
shown to correlate strongly with increases in violent
crimes in societies. This cocktail is what US Assistant
Secretary of State for African Affairs, Johnnie Carson
referred to when he stated that Nigeria’s Boko Haram was
capitalizing on popular discontent with bad governance in
Nigeria in general and the North in particular. The fact
that virtually all indices of development and progress have
been deteriorating from 2007 in spite of being a period of
high oil prices and production should make every
thoughtful person to question what is happening.
The Yar’Adua-Jonathan administration inherited about US
$50 billion in foreign reserves, USD $27 billion in the
excess crude account, and only USD $3 billion in foreign
debt. Yar’Adua-Jonathan inherited a country that was
liquid and had a strong balance sheet, with BB- sovereign
credit rating by rating agencies. The economic prospects
were bright if the political economy was managed well.
The twin deficits of electricity and rail transport were
being addressed through the award of contracts to build
seven new power stations and the Lagos-Kano dual-track,
standard gauge railway line.
Over the ensuing four years, the federation earned
another USD $180 billion from oil and gas, import duties
and taxes. By 2011, all these resources had been wasted
with little to show for it. The excess crude account had
been run down to less than USD $1 billion, the reserves
drawn down to about USD $35 billion and none of the rail
and power infrastructure projects completed. What is
significant is that since February 2010 when he became
acting president, Mr. Jonathan has been borrowing an
average of USD $1 billion monthly, mostly by issuing
bonds, thereby doubling our total debt levels to nearly
USD $42 billion and counting. The federal government is
fast accelerating towards insolvency!
In April 2007, Sheikh Jaafar was murdered in cold blood
while praying in his mosque in Kano by assailants that
years later turned out to be suspected members of a sect
to be known as Boko Haram, operating out of Bauchi
State. However at the time the Sheikh was killed, an
attempt was made to link the murder to the state
governor Ibrahim Shekarau. This as we shall see, became
a recurring pattern of behaviour by the security agencies
in cases of this nature – the politicization of terrorism.
In July 2009, Yar’Adua deployed the Nigerian Army to
“crush” Boko Haram. The leaders of the sect were
captured alive, or arrested from their homes and extra-
judicially executed by the Nigerian Police. The sect
believes that Ali Modu Sheriff, then governor of Borno
State and the Commissioner of Police took the decision to
wipe out its leadership. They regrouped and went on
what was essentially a revenge mission targeting the
Police, the Borno State Government and other uniformed
services of the Federal Government. That is how Boko
Haram evolved from a largely peaceful, fringe Islamic
organization to a vengeful sect and currently an anarchist
threat to the Nigerian nation.
Initially, Boko Haram’s targets were symbols of authority
(Police, Borno State Government, etc.) and limited
geographically (Borno State) in scope. The attitude of
authorities to the sect’s activities(e.g. Northerners are
killing one another, so we do not care, etc.)emboldened
them, and when the first bomb was exploded by MEND in
Abuja on October 1, 2010, the sect learnt a thing or two
about how to grab national attention. As the media gave
the sect attention, it mainstreamed its activities to first
attack Yobe State then the Federal Capital Territory.
The watershed in the sect’s activities were the June 2011
bombing of the Police Headquarters and the August 2011
attack on the UN Headquarters. By these actions the sect
established the capacity to operate in the nation’s capital,
outside its original geographic location thus attracting
national and global attention. Sadly, between 2009 and
2012, more than 1,000 people have lost their lives as a
result of Boko Haram’s attacks in Maiduguri, Potiskum,
Damaturu, Jos, Kano, Gombe, Kaduna and Abuja. In 2011
alone, Boko Haram attacked 115 times with 550 deaths
resulting.
According to the World Investment Report of UNCTAD, the
Nigerian economy recorded a reduction in foreign direct
investment from USD $8.65 billion in 2009 to USD $6.1
billion in 2010 due to the fear of Boko Haram. The
Nigerian tourism sector which is worth some N80 billion
annually has lost more than half of its value due to fear of
terrorist attacks. The domestic aviation industry which
generates some N3 billion annually has been hard hit by
flight cancellations to destinations in the north, with nearly
half of the revenues lost.
In Borno State, schools have been closed. In other
affected parts of the north, normal social life is unlikely to
return soon. In places like Jos, the city is so neatly divided
along ethnic lines that the vibrancy and inclusion that has
been its heartbeat has been lost for a long time to come.
The recent attack on media houses and Bayero University
has opened new areas and targets of the sect that should
worry the authorities.
The north has been the hardest hit with the leading
commercial centre, Kano being under military occupation
since January 2012. Kaduna, a leading industrial centre
has also been repeatedly attacked by the various shades
of what is known as Boko Haram. Many of us believe that
there are at least four variants of Boko Haram – the real
BH and three other fakes – sponsored by the government,
politicians and criminal groups – that use the brand to
advance their own self-centered agendas.
Many in the North see the patent inaction of the
authorities as the advancement of a sinister agenda to
destroy an already near prostate northern economy
through occupation, militarization and disruption of socio-
economic activities. The federal government has done
nothing to deny these or indicate otherwise, and the state
governments have acquiesced to the cavalier attitude of
the Villa.
Terrorism and corruption are big issues with no easy
solutions. There are no silver bullets and no country has
been able to eradicate corruption or be totally immune
from domestic terrorism. I will make some suggestions
here as a basis for discussion and way forward.
I do not think our anti-corruption strategy attacks the
roots of corruption. In addition to the unsuccessful ‘arrest-
and-charge’ approach that we have focused on, I believe
we must reduce cash transactions to the barest minimum.
If all transactions are electronic, it will be harder for
untraceable, illicit payments to be made. If CBN’s push
towards cashless banking is complemented with a national
ID system that can identify, monitor and audit every
resident, and his or her financial transactions when a
court order is obtained, it will be harder to take bribes
and launder the money.
We also need to strengthen institutions by appointing
decent people to head them, respect their tenures and
appoint successors from within rather than bring in
political hacks to do jobs that they are neither qualified
nor trained to do. Our judiciary needs revamping.
Terrorism is a harder nut to crack. I am of the view that a
multi-track approach is necessary to increase the chances
of its success. First, the prevailing narrative in the
Jonathan camp must be discarded. This narrative is what
the national security adviser tried to communicate at the
Asaba summit of south-south leaders, but was
misunderstood by the media. Jonathan and his inner circle
believe that Boko Haram is a northern conspiracy to
prevent Jonathan enjoying his presidency.
This narrative is believed by most Niger Delta leaders
because of their own experience in organizing, training
and arming the militants and providing funding for MEND
during the period of ‘resource control’ agitations of the
Obasanjo administration. Because theirs was a conspiracy
of the political elite, they think the North must have done
the same. They also feel that Boko Haram largely kills
northerners or “parasites” as one Jonathan aide Reno
Omokri once tweeted; so the more they are killed, the
lesser the burden on the ‘oil-rich hosts’.
With this narrative wired in the brains of Jonathan’s inner
circle, they spent their first year trying to link some of us
in opposition to Boko Haram instead of honestly facing the
real culprits. While wasting time on us, the sect grew
stronger, bolder and better trained. The first step
therefore is to unwind this narrative and honestly ask the
right questions.
It is of course disingenuous to believe the narrative, but I
assure you that they believe it. Boko Haram’s first bloody
confrontation with the authorities was under a northern,
Muslim president in 2009. And Obasanjo is not a
northerner and a muslim but governed without Boko
Haram. Anyone can see that it is indeed northerners and
Muslims that constitute the bulk of the victims of the
insurgency. And I think the insurgency escalated not
because Jonathan became president by whatever means,
but because the government did not care to address it
early enough. Now things have spiraled out of control.
Secondly, I believe the fundamental roots of the
insurgency challenge – rewarding those who take up arms
against the state with the cash hand-outs called amnesty
program has to be reviewed. Any society that rewards bad
behavior with cash creates a moral hazard that may
consume that society. Those giving out the cash should
know that they are doing no favors to anyone. Indeed,
they are fostering an entitlement culture that would
ultimately be the undoing of that part of the country.
Boko Haram does not appear to be motivated by money,
so those thinking of an amnesty-like program may need to
go back to the drawing board.
Thirdly, the corruption, inequality, poverty and
unemployment cocktail that gave birth to violent crimes
and terrorism need to be addressed through well-thought
out and targeted programs of investment in education,
healthcare, skills development and training, and
infrastructure building that will provide employment
opportunities in various communities. In addition, the
authorities must criminalize the existence of political thugs
by whatever name and of whatever description, and
ensure elections are free, fair and credible. The political
parties need reforms, leadership selection be guided
largely by merit, while the electoral institutions need to be
alive to their responsibilities.
Fourthly, as a medium term, structural measure, we must
work to restore our federalism to the broad outlines
embedded in the 1963 republican constitution, devolving
more powers and responsibilities to the states and making
the federal government less of a busy body. This would
require that states like Bauchi whose annual internally-
generated revenue is N7 billion should not run a
government costing N58 billion because of monthly hand-
outs from Abuja. Each state should learn to live within its
means and seek to actively develop its comparative
endowments. State governors will then be compelled to
use their resources better and not point fingers at the
federal government.
Finally, in addition to reviewing the failed military strategy
now in place and scaling back what has become the
militarization of the north, the government must work
with community leaders in Borno, Yobe, Plateau, Kano
and Kaduna States to identify interlocutors that would
enable honest discussions with Boko Haram to establish
what they REALLY want. The arrest and prosecution of
those that murdered their leaders would certainly be one
demand, but there may be others that the government
knows but would not want us to know. The Maitatsine
sect was easily defeated in the 1980s because the
surrounding communities despised them and their
methods. The current situation in Kano and Borno States
is one in which the military occupiers are killing more
innocent people than Boko Haram, which injustice is
creating resentment against the Army. Unless the reckless
killings of unarmed men, women and children stop, these
communities would revolt sooner or later.
There is nowhere in the world where insurgencies like
Boko Haram have been defeated purely through military
force and occupation – ask the Americans about
Afghanistan and Iraq, or the British about Northern
Ireland. Those saying “crush them” should know that
recent history of the war on terror is not on their side. We
want a country that works for everyone, and this senseless
loss of lives must end soon. The government that has the
responsibility for our security must bend over backwards
to deliver it. If they continue to fail in this regard, they
will not be in government for too long.

#CONSENSUS 2015