In less than six decades--since its independence--Nigeria has had over half a dozen of coup d’états, a civil war, and different attempts at democracy in various guises. That’s some political baggage for a relatively young nation--just a century old. Throw into this mix geo-ethno-religious fervour and flavours; you have a very potent political cocktail. In spite of these monumental difficulties, the country is yet to come a cropper. For a country once described by The Economist as one where the best is impossible and the worst never happens, it is remarkable--it has managed to navigate the choppy political waters, although without direction, destination or destiny.

It is within these choppy waters that the merchants of mayhem--Boko Haram--fancied their chances and compounded that turbulent sea with whirlwind of carnage. The free-floating atmosphere of paranoia and finger pointing--brought about by the carnage--within the political class has more or less given the Islamists terrorists a carte blanche to kill, kidnap, maim, and pillage with impunity.

The question on the minds of every Nigerian and the political punditry community outside the country is: can the country survive 2015? How was the magic year conjured? This magic year--2015--was not pulled out of the thin air. It is an election year--presidential election, elections into its federal legislature and State elections. A significant number of Nigerians--ardent bloggers and political commentators--has adduced the year as the year CIA predicted the break-up of the country; this in spite of denial and dissociation from this prediction by the US government. Some fair weather politicians are strategically jostling for position for an eventual break-up. This political shenanigan is deplorable, dangerous and detracting from the increasing challenge and carnage the average Nigerians have to put up in their hard grind of life to eke out a meagre living.

In a recent interview with Reuters as regards the carnage inflicted by Boko Haram and the likelihood of a break up, the Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, stated: ‘I think ironically it’s less likely now.’ This view is not just an optimistic view or a good reading of the political tea leaf, but an insightful understanding of the psyche of the average Nigerian, failed by its successive corrupt leadership, lack of accountability and poor governance.

Why break up is unlikely

It would be apt to describe Nigeria and its people as a social Complex system--that is readily adaptable. It was the Scottish enlightenment moral philosopher, Adam Smith, that first observed the law of unintended consequences. This law is unleashed when there is intervention or perturbation of a complex system. The unintended consequences would either lead to a positive effect--serendipity--or unexpected negative detriment.

It is a given that the Islamists terrorist group has exposed the lack of strategic capacity within the Nigerian military. It is a given that the tactical/operational response of the military is abysmal. It is a given that the ruling class is bereft of ideas, insight and understanding that an existential threat from a group like Boko Haram presents--a clear and present danger that could trammel Nigeria down the well worn path to Somalia. It is also a given that the terrorist group has succeeded in infantilising the political class leading to their finger-pointing and very little else. Their lack of strategic apprehension of the existential threat that the nation faces, left them to shoot from the hip while the group laughs them to scorn.

However, unlike the quibbling political class, the resolute resolve and the resilience of the hard working Nigerians make the break-up of the country unlikely. In Boko Haram’s pernicious resolve to sow seeds of discord--it envisaged would unravel the geo-ethno-religious fault lines which will ultimately disaggregate the country--it misjudged the germ of hope and optimism twinned with aspiration in the life of the average Nigerian. In some strange and uncanny way Boko Haram brought change--not the change the long suffering Nigerians have yearned and hankered after for decades--a change, nevertheless, that allows the people to ask questions of its leadership and the political class. This class, by its political action and inaction, created the enabling environment conducive for anarchy and violence to take firm roots within country’s social space. It is Boko Haram today--or shall we say this decade--only heaven knows what it could be in decades to come; if the political paradigm remains in its current form, process, appearance and practice.

A new paradigm

Nigeria’s political process in its current form is enamoured with favour culture which breeds poor governance, incompetence, impunity and lack of accountability, gross inequality, and disenfranchisement of a significant number of its citizenry from any meaningful pursuits. This promotes wanton corruption--the inability to differentiate public trust from private treasury--and it is a potent challenge to the rule of law, the civil society and the effectiveness of public institutions. It is this inability to differentiate public trust and private treasury in the political landscape over decades that gave the impetus to different kinds of extreme ideologies. It is within this landscape that Boko Haram, a group with a barely intelligible ideology--befitting of a 21st century modern state--laid down its pervasive roots and now prominently pervade every Nigerian discourse. Whatever is now left of Nigeria’s tarnished and tattered image, Boko Haram’s acrid aroma serenades. At present nobody talks about Nigeria--outside its shores-- without mentioning this atavistic group in the same breath.

Image laundering of the nation will do very little--to change conceptions and deeply held beliefs about Nigeria outside its shores--while the Chibok girls’ whereabouts remain unknown. Further, Boko Haram’s capacity and capability to inflict wanton carnage at will make such pursuit a total waste of resources and efforts.

Way forward

I have argued elsewhere that Nigeria and its people in some strange way can now look themselves in the eye and ask the pertinent question: how did it come to this?

The current lenses--heavily tainted with ethnic, tribal and religious opacities--have been less than effective to provide the country with a vision of direction, destiny and destination. It was time with a determined deliberateness, Nigerians removed these pernicious spectacles that have kept them entranced for too long with the current political paradigm and sought alternatives to their current engagement with the democratic process. Nigerians should come to the fact that the only permanent aspect of reality is change. Change has come to stay. A new narrative and language are required to engage with change.

The carnage by Boko Haram and its pernicious ideology of Wahabhisim--a very virulent strain of Sunni Islam--unfortunately is a symptom of what Nigeria has become. The root cause of the terrorist group goes deeper than the group and its interpretation of Islamic doctrines. The cause of the nation’s problems--of which Boko Haram is a part--is firmly rooted in democratic deficit and lack of democratic dividends cascading down its citizenry.

When a group of people are marginalised for decades without hope, aspiration or language to conceptualise their deplorable plight, it takes very little to harness their psychological dividends, and turn it into something potent and potentially lethal. This is so true, particularly when concepts, proposition, and language are bandied around them as regards their plight by their potential handlers in the indoctrination exercise. Further, this vulnerable group have their difficulties acknowledged; and finds within the environment affirmation and validation. It takes very little to harness the powerful group dynamics that develop subsequently, which provide them with a new narrative as an in-group wrestling against the out-group--“the oppressors”. Every means is deployed against the oppressors; each and every oppressor is fair game.

It has to be said that real security in civil society comes from the people. Boko Haram has a simple and effective narrative. Nigerian people and its leadership should come up with a more potent narrative that transverse ethno-religious divides.

Now, more to the point, the solution to the mayhem should be all encompassing and eclectic. It requires a political will--devoid of partisanship--that should provide a clear strategy and direction within a space that values concerted efforts of well-meaning Nigerians. The strategy should include identifiable time horizon--short term, intermediate and long term--and what the strategy is envisaged to achieve during the period. A time like this is when expertise and competence are required within a multidisciplinary, multiagency arrangement. The strategy should consist of an admixture of hard and soft power.

Practical steps

First, Nigeria needs to--starting from its ruling elite--acknowledge that this is an existential threat; and desists from politicising and sectionalising the threats. Further, the leadership should be open and honest to Nigerians and refrain from denial and political gimmickry that smacks of political short-termism.

Second, the military should be properly equipped; up-skilled in intelligence gathering and analysis and the deployment of intercept technology and other reconnaissance missions as part of an ongoing comprehensive collaboration with other countries--western and non-western nation. The Islamists have exposed the vulnerability of Nigerian military, given years of poor investments and mismanagement. If there is any silver lining, political leaders should reconsider the whole structure of the military, to include short term and long term plans and decent investment--not business as usual kind of approach. Further consideration should be given to a mixture of a professional military and non-professional military, like Territorial Army (reservist) as in the UK. In this case in point, people from all walks of life can have military training, but go back to their day job and be called upon when required. The upside to this is that politicians may not be that paranoid regarding a highly and a well-equipped military that remains in the barracks waiting for an opportunity for a coup d’état. Further, the best and the brightest may be attracted to be trained and bring the most needed skill mix while remaining well-grounded in everyday reality of civilian life.

Third, an elite Corp of counterinsurgency that consists of the Military the Police, Psychological Profilers and local infiltrators akin to the squad that broke the backbone of IRA should be formed. Their remit inter alia should comprise of both soft and hard power. By that, I mean winning hearts and minds of reconcilable, infiltrating the group and pursing the irreconcilables to the very limits of the earth. The government should initiate talks with the terrorist group as soon as possible. Initially, this could be through intermediaries and later face-to-face talks with the group leadership. Even when there is no progress in these talks, attempts must be made to maintain the engagement. Through intelligence gathering and analysis, the government should identify the multiple sources of funding and supply of ordnance and materials. Not only to cut off such supply, but to have some control of these sources including using covert group to infiltrate and modify this vital supply chain. You will be amazed as regards the amount of information that could be gleaned from infiltrating the chain.

To ensure the effectiveness of this Corp, its members should be provided with decent life insurance policy underwritten by the Federal Government or its appointed underwriters; and families and beneficiaries should be identified during their recruitment, training and deployment. Those that die during their counter-terrorist engagement should be accorded decent burial and a welfare programme for their family and beneficiary should be robust and effective to mitigate their hardship.

Fourth, the rule of law should come down on perpetrators and saboteurs of the counter-terrorism efforts, regardless of the status of such miscreants.

Fifth, the captured members of the group should be treated humanely; and multidisciplinary centres for debriefing, re-education and re-socialisation and providing them with life skills should populate the soft power policy. Such fair treatment and engagement will not only serve as a good PR exercise, but aid the strategy of winning hearts and minds in the drive to reconcile the reconcilable.

Sixth, preaching of religious intolerance in different places of worship should be eschewed in the society.

Seventh, those rescued must be engaged by multidisciplinary experts to help with information that will facilitate their rehabilitation and reintegration back to the society.

Eighth, education with less emphasis on paper qualification and more emphasis on relevant life skills and apprenticeship should inform Nigeria's policy as part of its long term vision, given that economic improvement underpins social and political stability. A school curriculum that includes citizenship and history of Nigeria should help modify and bolster the training in school, civic centres and adult learning projects.

Ninth, a multidisciplinary and a multiagency approach should inform socioeconomic effort, particularly in the impoverished northern Nigeria; making space for civil society to help build and enhance engagement with democratic process is imperative.

The above should be subject to feedback mechanisms to audit and revisit the various projects within the programme to monitor its effectiveness and its overall impact on the citizenry and the political landscape.

In summary

Nigeria will likely survive 2015. It takes the will of the people to desire to live together-- regardless of their differences--this should not be taken away from them. Its politicians should refrain from complicating the choppy waters the country finds itself. Their politics should be less adversarial; bolstering of its democratic process to fight corruption and arrest the current level of democratic deficit that is toxic to democratic dividends is imperative. Its long suffering people have yearned and desired for this for too long and that is the least they deserve. Nigeria’s fight against one of the symptoms (Boko Haram) of its poor governance and corruption and gross inequality can only be won by its people.

Dr. Anayo Unachukwu

The author [email protected] is a psychiatrist based in the UK and holds a Masters of Law (LLM Medical Law) degree. He has interest in Medico-legal issues and the impact of inequality on health.