The terror siege

Like some wild flood determined to overwhelm, terrorists have laid a siege on Nigeria. They strike at will, and make arrogant boasts about what they’ve done and what they would yet do. Besides mounting casualties of their deadly exploits, constituting an onerous burden on the nation’s conscience, the precision of their daring assaults on the country’s sovereignty and security integrity – seemingly without restraint or hard retribution by government – is unsettling.

Early last week, two officers and some soldiers attached to the 7 Guards Brigade of the Nigerian Army were reported killed in an ambush by terrorists in Bwari, a suburb of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). The military personnel on patrol duties were said to have been ambushed after they visited the Nigerian Law School in Bwari, following a distress call from authorities there that terrorists had dropped a letter indicating an imminent attack on the school. According to reports, the officers and soldiers were at the law school for preliminary investigation, and it was on their way back after consulting with the school authorities that they were attacked by terrorists on the Kubwa-Bwari road. Besides fatalities, at least three other soldiers were injured in the ambush. Military authorities confirmed the attack, the casualties, and indications that terrorists were within Bwari environ with apparent intent to make good their threat to attack the law school.

Notice: these were soldiers of the elite Guards Brigade. But it wasn’t the first time terrorists were taking on the symbol of Nigerian sovereignty, namely President Muhammadu Buhari. Early in July, at least two policemen were reported killed and others injured when an advance convoy of the President to his Daura home in Katsina State, where he planned on spending the Sallah break, got attacked by terrorists near Dutsima. Presidency spokesmen explained that the convoy only happened upon an ongoing operation by the terrorists in that area; but even then, that they dared to take on the ‘intruding’ convoy with all its presidential panoply underscored the audacity of terrorists against the Nigerian state. Before then, it was while the President was holidaying in Katsina State that terrorists struck at Government Science Secondary School (GSSS), Kankara on 11th December, 2020 and corralled nearly 400 boys into captivity.  

Few days before the Bwari incident, terrorists who attacked a Kaduna-bound train service from Abuja on 28th March, killing eight persons and abducting 63 others out of which 23 have so far regained freedom – most, upon payment of huge ransoms – issued a new video. In the clip, the terrorists subjected the hapless captives to torture by brutally flogging them and threatening to kill some, sell off some and enslave others unless government accepts their demands. In obvious underhand against Nigerian statehood, they threatened to also kidnap President Buhari, Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai, senators and other top officials. Besides the torture of the train hostages, a distressing aspect of that footage was one of the captors claiming to be an escapee from Kuje prison in the FCT following its barnstorming on 5th July by terrorists who freed some 400 inmates, including 33 Boko Haram suspects who were held at the centre. The Kuje escapee taunted government with having successfully reunited with his comrades-in-terrorism despite being declared wanted after the prison break. Meanwhile, none of the train attackers or the Kuje facility barnstormers have till date been apprehended since their daredevil assaults on national security. 

“(Terrorists): Besides mounting casualties of their deadly exploits…the precision of their daring assaults on the country’s sovereignty and security integrity…is unsettling.”

And just as a meeting of the National Security Council (NSC) convened by President Buhari was rising late last week, another attack was enacted on a military checkpoint close to Zuma Rock on the fringes of Abuja. Without openly stating so, reality had earlier dawned on relevant authorities that terrorists were lurking with ill motives within the precincts of Nigeria’s seat of power. All primary and secondary schools in the FCT were peremptorily shut down early last week and students ordered home by the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), after federal authorities had shuttered the Federal Government College (FGC) in Kwali. The government of neighbouring Nasarawa State took a cue by abruptly rounding off the school term and shutting down all schools within its domain.  Even the University of Abuja was reported to have closed shop. The catch is: if you momentarily reflect on recent Nigerian nationhood history, you won’t help feeling some déjà vu. In the last years of the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan in 2014/2015, Boko Haram terrorists who had seized territory in the Northeast, especially in Borno State, took their dastardly exploits to Abuja where they struck at random with bombs on civil targets. The Muhammadu Buhari administration, upon taking office in 2015, managed to beat the terrorists back and recovered Nigerian territory. But here we are in the last year of that administration and terrorists seem to have taken their battle back to Abuja. Déjà vu: is history being repeated?

No one should ever make light of the sacrifices military personnel are making to tackle the terror scourge, especially with many having paid the supreme price in counter-terrorism operations. Against the backdrop of the resurgent siege by terrorists, the presidency reassured last week that security and defence forces weren’t clueless or helpless, only that the terrorists were employing propaganda and violence in a bid to force government’s acceptance of their demands. That sounded much like an implicit acknowledgment of parity of leverage between government and the terrorists, but just by the way. According to presidential spokesman, Mallam Garba Shehu, security forces have their plans to deal with the terrorists’ menace that they would not disclose in the media, but that they remain “acutely aware of their duties, responsibilities and what the nation expects of them (and) whenever they embark upon those actions, they expect that the public should provide them with needed support.” Pushing the same line of citizens’ responsibility after the NSC meeting on Thursday, National Security Adviser Major-Gen. Babagana Monguno (rtd.) noted that the battle against terrorists is asymmetric, hence requires the public to join forces with security operatives. He, however, admitted that new strategies were needed on the part of the security forces to boost the momentum against the terrorists.

It was helpful that the National Security Adviser acknowledged that security forces weren’t at their best yet, because  you can’t deny palpable deficits in intelligence and its application, where available, in security operations. House of Representatives Speaker Ahmed Wase made known last week that there were 44 security reports by the Department of State Security (DSS) prior to the Kuje prison attack, yet the attack happened and perpetrators still on the lose. Wase’s claim aligned with another by Interior Minister Rauf Aregbesola that the incident would have been averted but for lack of will to act on intelligence received. 

In his statement on the train attackers’ video, Garba Shehu said: “The dilemma in dealing with the specific case of the train terrorists are manifold: punitive action like the popular call for carpet bombing of known locations may assuage the desire of an angry public for revenge, but what about the hostages? They have committed no offense. All they did was to board a train.” But we could ask: what happened to the ‘reconnaissance-infiltration-and-sneak attack’ strategy, or whatever name by which it is called in professional warfare parlance? Even the terrorists seem to have a handle on this strategy. When government held their members in Kuje prison, they successfully stormed the facility and sprung those members free – along with other inmates, of course – without rendering the members collateral casualties in the attack. Given their precision, Senate President Ahmad Lawan couldn’t help fingering insider complicity. So, why is it so impossible for security forces to infiltrate purportedly known camps of terrorists and deal them deadly blows while springing their hostages lose, without those hostages becoming casualties in erratic carpet bombing operations? 

Let’s face it: defective intel and lack of proactive application of available intel are the bane of the battle against terror. The humbling thing is that terrorists now appear to be getting an upper hand in those same strategies of warfare.