Boko Haram kills 30 in Northeastern Nigeria

Boko Haram Takfiri terrorists have attacked two villages in northeastern Nigerian Borno state, killing at least 30 people. The militants on Thursday (about 0100 GMT) stormed the villages of Thlaimakalama and Gatamarwa, some 15 kilometers from the town of Chibok, and set them on fire, according to Pogo Bitrus, head of the Chibok Elders Forum. “From information coming in from residents of the two villages at least 30 people were killed in the attacks,” he said. Luka Haruna, a Chibok resident, also gave the same death toll saying, “the two villages were completely destroyed.” Chibok gained notoriety last April when Boko Haram terrorists kidnapped 276 schoolgirls from their secondary school. Last Monday, the Boko Haram militants invaded two villages on their way as they fled the nearby town of Askira Uba.“The insurgents mowed everything in sight as they fled Askira Uba and these two villages which they passed through became targets,” Bitrus said, adding, “They opened fire on residents and set houses on fire as they drove in a huge convoy.” The Nigerian army announced on Thursday that its fighter jets had bombarded Boko Haram’s stronghold in the forest. In the face of military operations by the Nigerian army, the Boko Haram militants have fled towards Gwoza, on the border with Cameroon, and the nearby Sambisa Forest, where Takfiri militants have camps. Boko Haram militants took control of Gwoza in June 2014 and set up their base in the town. They further declared it part of their so-called Islamic caliphate. The violence fueled by Boko Haram militants, starting in 2009, has killed at least 13,000 people and rendered more than a million others homeless.

Boko Haram in Nigeria is a child of Nigerian history and the impunity of Northern Nigeria’s Military establishment. Armed conflict is part of Nigeria history. It is also a business which has enriched many.  People including generations unborn learn from history. The savaged brutality meted on civilians and civilian objects in Nigeria pre-exist Boko Haram. These acts of impunity were some of the methods deployed by successive military regimes, most of them from Northern Generals to accede and sustain power. The ongoing slaughter by Boko Haram follows the same pattern which in 1966 led to the Nigeria/Biafra War. The underlying cause of the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Southerners, mainly of the Ibo ethnic groups in the North was never comprehensively investigated, if at all.  There is no gainsaying that had the crimes been investigated, the result would have pointed to some powerful individuals within the Nigerian Military structure of Northern origin. For these, political power and control of the economy could only be attained through scapegoating communities whom they perceived as serious competitors.

The Nigerian/Biafra War was a curse on the conscience of the nation but a blessing to the Northern Military establishment. Many of these Generals made fortunes from the war and took the opportunity to entrench themselves in power. Olusegun Obasanjo like Good luck Jonathan came to power during that period as a beneficiary of the sad spoils of death. They were considered outsiders or trespassers to their god ordained power. For this reason, the country had to be made ungovernable to prove them and any person outside the North unfit to defend the constitutional order, national cohesion and republican values.  Under these dire circumstances, the Northern Military establishment, their feudal and religious confederacy would step in and take back power through democratic or other means. This is the rationale of the unfolding drama in the election taking place on 14 February 2015.

The culture of impunity and unchecked state supervised criminality against civilians during military rule under the Northern Military establishment in Nigeria was unprecedented.  This is the culture of impunity that gave birth to claims for Sharia States in some Northern states and coordinated attacks against Christians in Northern Nigeria.  The sharia claims emerged only when Olusegun Obasanjo a Christian from the West was elected as the first democratic President of Nigeria after Military rule. The political motivation for this move using religion a lethal weapon was not lost on keen observers of Nigerian politics nor to the Southern Military establishment and politicians or even Obasanjo. The hidden hand of his military peers from the North behind these acts of destabilization was obvious. This did not happen during the military rule dominated by the Northern Military establishment so also the so-called Fulani herdsmen slaughter of Christians and burning of Christian Churches in the North and the Middle Belt.