General Christopher Musa, the Chief of Defense Staff, has explained why the fight against the Boko Haram terrorist group has lasted so long, highlighting the complexity of the conflict, which has affected northeastern Nigeria for more than ten years.
General Musa described how Boko Haram’s strategy changed over time, beginning with strikes on soft targets and eventually progressing to more complex attacks, during his appearance on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Friday.
Beginning in 2011, the group launched suicide bombings targeting police stations and the United Nations office in Abuja, intensifying the threat.
In response, the Nigerian government declared a state of emergency in 2012, which was extended across the entire northeast in 2013, as part of efforts to curb the insurgency.
However, despite these measures, Boko Haram’s violence has led to the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent civilians and displaced approximately 2.3 million people since May 2013.
General Musa explained that several factors have contributed to the ongoing conflict, including the evolving strategies of the insurgents and the difficult terrain of counter-insurgency operations.
The military’s battle has been prolonged by the insurgents’ ability to adapt and the challenges of securing a vast and often hostile region.
“This Boko Haram thing is a lot. Then I tell you this, for them to have survived for 16 years and are still fighting, how are they getting their funding? Who’s sustaining them? Because they cannot just be doing it actively just like that.
“What I tell people is- no country should allow this kind of thing to commence. It is a difficult operation to eradicate, extremely difficult.
“Because before now, when we had the conventional kind of warfare, you are fighting a country. You know you’re fighting for territory. You want to achieve something.
“Now you are fighting with people that have nothing to lose. It is an ideology they have in their minds. They believe they are right and you are wrong. He believes if he kills you, he’s getting a blessing. If you kill him, he’s going to heaven. That’s absolutely nothing to lose.
“That makes it very, very difficult, and it’s not written on their foreheads. So, how do you identify who is who?
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“And they’ve realized that we obey international laws, they don’t. So what do they do? They use human shields. Anytime they have anything, they go with people, so that you cannot attack them, you cannot shoot, and that’s what makes it so.
“When people say, why is it taking so long? It is a very, very difficult operation to do, because you make the mistake, you kill some people, and your country comes after you. If you don’t kill them [the terrorists], and they continue striving. So, in both ways, you are at the receiving end.
“Because you are wearing a uniform, you can be identified. You are, by law, constitutionally held down on certain things that you must obey. So those are the issues we are facing.
“You know, like I told you, if it was conventional warfare with the equipment, armaments we have now, we’ll go to a community and flatten the entire community where they live. We’ll end this in the very short term, but you can’t do that anymore.”
