Y-man
02-08-2015, 02:46 PM
I got a shout-out from Kevin, Boolit Master, who had concern about what has been in the news recently about Nigeria, and he was also quite worried, not having seen me on CastBoolits for a while now.
I'm good. Family is good. Thanks for the care and concern.
State of Emergency - the Boko Haram issue in Northern Nigeria
Current state of affairs –
Daily raids on towns and villages, military bases attacked and in some cases, overrun, soldiers, civilians and all being killed wantonly in the North East mainly. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced, and have had to survive in squalid camps.
Almost all other areas seem isolated from this, and life seems to be going on well. I am currently based in the South of Nigeria, and there is no immediate hazard, but we all have family affected.
What you see in the news, and in the press is ALL TRUE. [And it is even worse than you hear or see]
In all this: we have a government that is completely clueless and without focus.
I support the decisive action being taken now [With elections coming up] against the "extremists", but worry that we might be going about it in several wrong ways. It is good that we seem to be getting support from the Chadians, and others: who seem to be very warrior-like and assertive in fighting Boko Haram.
What should happen is sharp, tactical strikes using well-trained, equipped, disciplined and well-led strike/ Special Forces. Not flooding the states with large number of ill-mannered, uncontrollable louts whose forte has always been indiscriminate killings, looting, raping and more. (Odi, Liberia, Sierra Leone can testify: even though the last two will probably say the Nigerian troops were the lesser of all evils.)
Are you aware that the human rights abuses have been happening on a large scale? A colleague's brother was shot and killed by soldiers in Maiduguri in 2014 when he went to pick children from school. MANY more have happened, in the course of this issue, on both sides. There is MASSIVE exodus from those areas now. How is it that the citizens fear the Nigerian Armed Forces more than the terrorists now? It is not a conventional war!
You think we can succeed in conventionally fighting people that melt into the populace easily? Go and ask the US and other countries in Afghanistan and Iraq and Somalia: the wheel-Barrow Vendor that serves you tea and bread in the morning is the same one that cuts your throat at night...The market stall owner that sells you sustenance in the daytime, calls for an IED on your street at night. You cannot know their faces, they do not wear uniforms! Killing EVERYONE is not the solution: winning back the people, giving everyone something to worry about: a job, food on the table, family, is what solves the problem!
Do you know that Army chiefs have always been pocketing money meant to feed soldiers in those states? Do you know that even in transit, there have been two near-mutinies by HUNGRY soldiers who were not fed for 48 hours? Is it not the HORRIBLE corruption in this country that needs to be fought? Not going to kill innocent people...(And labeling all as Boko Haram...)
Bold step would have been to give even a few more people jobs, bold step would have been bringing back the billions of dollars stolen and hoarded abroad and opening factories here to give people hope: when someone does not have hope, what do you think life means? NOTHING! That is why you hear the harrowing story of someone gladly accepting =N=5,000 [$ 25 – TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS!] to carry out a suicide bombing of a church! If he had something to live for now: a job that brings him even enough to think of marrying, and having a child, and food to eat, even once a day...
The corruption and injustice is EVERYWHERE! Not only in the North. The Niger Delta fought: now there is "amnesty" with massive pay-outs, and illiterate fools of “former militants” are cruising Hummers in the cities of Warri and Port Harcourt, brushing other motorists off the road, and killing themselves "mafia-style" every day. Soon, everyone will be carrying their muzzle-loading hunting guns and tying red bandannas in EVERY region of Nigeria because that seems to be the way to get some slices of the "National Cake". Really sad but the North is a special case: the people there have been suppressed by their own elite for so long, under the guise of religion and "acceptance of what the Almighty Allah has decreed" that they have become sub-human. There are people there that have not taken a bath since the last rainfall in 2014. There are people there that have not touched a total cumulative of =N= 500 [$ 2.5] income this year! (Five HUNDRED Naira! Less than three dollars!) I KNOW: I come from the middle-Belt but have lived and worked in the North: and not just in the cities: I have lived and worked in the villages, where they appoint the man who has a radio set as king. The injustice in this country is BAD: and a governor will tell you he has the right to give a praise-singing musician a brand new Toyota Prado SUV from OUR money, when at that moment, within that hour, up to 300 women were dying in childbirth because of no Health Care, up to 400 children were breathing their last from Malaria (Malaria! A disease that has been eradicated in some parts of the world.) And teachers have not been paid their salaries for 10 months!
Why has there not been success in battling the Boko Haram madmen? The same corruption rears its ugly head even within the military: even mid-level officers: Majors, Colonels, get involved in “deals” and make money to build massive mansions in Abuja and Lagos. What do you then expect from the pot-bellied Generals? They own entire swathes of land and properties! But the soldier on the battlefront survives on ONE dollop of BEANS per day in a plastic bowl!
They get their money from where? From the subvention meant to buy ammo for troops, from the allowances for troops feeding, from the funds meant for troops equipment. Massive amounts of funds diverted into private accounts.
Because of all these: troops are going into combat with 35-year old AK 47s, given 60 rounds of ammo, they are ill-trained, not motivated, and barely fed.
In the barracks, they see the widows of their killed colleagues being treated horrendously, and kicked out of accommodation within weeks.
They see their wounded colleagues receiving rudimentary medical care.
It starts from the impunity which we all see around us. When everyone (especially from the very top of government - where patronage is even more pervasive and evil) is getting away with everything, you expect others not to "try"?
Imagine curbing wasteful government trips abroad and putting the money into Education?
Imagine reducing the wasteful budget for meals in Aso Rock [The Government House - Our own "White House"], and putting it into Medicine?
Imagine making sure funds get to the right places, rather than into few people's pockets?
Imagine....
We just can only pray for leadership that will bring back hope, real, genuine, achievable hope, and things will change.
I'm good. Family is good. Thanks for the care and concern.
State of Emergency - the Boko Haram issue in Northern Nigeria
Current state of affairs –
Daily raids on towns and villages, military bases attacked and in some cases, overrun, soldiers, civilians and all being killed wantonly in the North East mainly. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced, and have had to survive in squalid camps.
Almost all other areas seem isolated from this, and life seems to be going on well. I am currently based in the South of Nigeria, and there is no immediate hazard, but we all have family affected.
What you see in the news, and in the press is ALL TRUE. [And it is even worse than you hear or see]
In all this: we have a government that is completely clueless and without focus.
I support the decisive action being taken now [With elections coming up] against the "extremists", but worry that we might be going about it in several wrong ways. It is good that we seem to be getting support from the Chadians, and others: who seem to be very warrior-like and assertive in fighting Boko Haram.
What should happen is sharp, tactical strikes using well-trained, equipped, disciplined and well-led strike/ Special Forces. Not flooding the states with large number of ill-mannered, uncontrollable louts whose forte has always been indiscriminate killings, looting, raping and more. (Odi, Liberia, Sierra Leone can testify: even though the last two will probably say the Nigerian troops were the lesser of all evils.)
Are you aware that the human rights abuses have been happening on a large scale? A colleague's brother was shot and killed by soldiers in Maiduguri in 2014 when he went to pick children from school. MANY more have happened, in the course of this issue, on both sides. There is MASSIVE exodus from those areas now. How is it that the citizens fear the Nigerian Armed Forces more than the terrorists now? It is not a conventional war!
You think we can succeed in conventionally fighting people that melt into the populace easily? Go and ask the US and other countries in Afghanistan and Iraq and Somalia: the wheel-Barrow Vendor that serves you tea and bread in the morning is the same one that cuts your throat at night...The market stall owner that sells you sustenance in the daytime, calls for an IED on your street at night. You cannot know their faces, they do not wear uniforms! Killing EVERYONE is not the solution: winning back the people, giving everyone something to worry about: a job, food on the table, family, is what solves the problem!
Do you know that Army chiefs have always been pocketing money meant to feed soldiers in those states? Do you know that even in transit, there have been two near-mutinies by HUNGRY soldiers who were not fed for 48 hours? Is it not the HORRIBLE corruption in this country that needs to be fought? Not going to kill innocent people...(And labeling all as Boko Haram...)
Bold step would have been to give even a few more people jobs, bold step would have been bringing back the billions of dollars stolen and hoarded abroad and opening factories here to give people hope: when someone does not have hope, what do you think life means? NOTHING! That is why you hear the harrowing story of someone gladly accepting =N=5,000 [$ 25 – TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS!] to carry out a suicide bombing of a church! If he had something to live for now: a job that brings him even enough to think of marrying, and having a child, and food to eat, even once a day...
The corruption and injustice is EVERYWHERE! Not only in the North. The Niger Delta fought: now there is "amnesty" with massive pay-outs, and illiterate fools of “former militants” are cruising Hummers in the cities of Warri and Port Harcourt, brushing other motorists off the road, and killing themselves "mafia-style" every day. Soon, everyone will be carrying their muzzle-loading hunting guns and tying red bandannas in EVERY region of Nigeria because that seems to be the way to get some slices of the "National Cake". Really sad but the North is a special case: the people there have been suppressed by their own elite for so long, under the guise of religion and "acceptance of what the Almighty Allah has decreed" that they have become sub-human. There are people there that have not taken a bath since the last rainfall in 2014. There are people there that have not touched a total cumulative of =N= 500 [$ 2.5] income this year! (Five HUNDRED Naira! Less than three dollars!) I KNOW: I come from the middle-Belt but have lived and worked in the North: and not just in the cities: I have lived and worked in the villages, where they appoint the man who has a radio set as king. The injustice in this country is BAD: and a governor will tell you he has the right to give a praise-singing musician a brand new Toyota Prado SUV from OUR money, when at that moment, within that hour, up to 300 women were dying in childbirth because of no Health Care, up to 400 children were breathing their last from Malaria (Malaria! A disease that has been eradicated in some parts of the world.) And teachers have not been paid their salaries for 10 months!
Why has there not been success in battling the Boko Haram madmen? The same corruption rears its ugly head even within the military: even mid-level officers: Majors, Colonels, get involved in “deals” and make money to build massive mansions in Abuja and Lagos. What do you then expect from the pot-bellied Generals? They own entire swathes of land and properties! But the soldier on the battlefront survives on ONE dollop of BEANS per day in a plastic bowl!
They get their money from where? From the subvention meant to buy ammo for troops, from the allowances for troops feeding, from the funds meant for troops equipment. Massive amounts of funds diverted into private accounts.
Because of all these: troops are going into combat with 35-year old AK 47s, given 60 rounds of ammo, they are ill-trained, not motivated, and barely fed.
In the barracks, they see the widows of their killed colleagues being treated horrendously, and kicked out of accommodation within weeks.
They see their wounded colleagues receiving rudimentary medical care.
It starts from the impunity which we all see around us. When everyone (especially from the very top of government - where patronage is even more pervasive and evil) is getting away with everything, you expect others not to "try"?
Imagine curbing wasteful government trips abroad and putting the money into Education?
Imagine reducing the wasteful budget for meals in Aso Rock [The Government House - Our own "White House"], and putting it into Medicine?
Imagine making sure funds get to the right places, rather than into few people's pockets?
Imagine....
We just can only pray for leadership that will bring back hope, real, genuine, achievable hope, and things will change.