Like Sulhu, Unlike Amnesty

Beyond pampering terrorists through the federal government Sulhu programme, security agencies should adopt a more responsive and spread-out approach that could address the threats of the anti-social elements, like the amnesty programme of the Niger Delta region. Iyobosa Uwugiaren reports

Even though insiders in the Defence Headquarters say the horrendous state of insecurity created by the deadly activities of terrorist groups in Nigeria have reduced by 39 percent in the last two months – due to dexterous strategies by the nation’s security agencies, the new strategy – Sulhu programme, being executed in the northern part of the country to tackle terrorists, is generating mixed reactions.

From the analysis of many security experts and defence headquarters, radical Islamist terrorist groups like Boko Haram and the breakaway Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP) in the scrubland of the North-east, remain the local terrorist threat to the country.

These groups consistently stir up and capitalise on the nation’s weak governance, conflict, political instability, ethno-religious crises and longstanding political whinges to pursue their deadly aims. And of recent, they have employed different ways and means that have hugely challenged the security agencies counterterrorism hard work, including setting state-like governing institutions within some local government areas in the North-east and North-west parts of the country, and employing sophisticated weapons – so much so that they can now bring down military fighting helicopters.

Many believe that the attack on the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA), the nation’s institution that recruits and trains the military personnel, killing two senior officers and abducted a military personnel, by the insurgents signals the fact the nation’s insecurity has reached a frightening level.

Commenting on the attack on NDA, His Royal Majesty, Retired Air Vice Marshall Lucky Ararile, the Ovie of Umiagwa Kingdom in Delta State, said that the bold attack by bandits on NDA, shows that nowhere is safe in Nigeria. “We are not sure that even Aso Rock or any military unit is safe any longer. Government has to tackle these bandits or whatever they call themselves with the seriousness it deserves. These embarrassments are becoming too much,” he said.

The Chief of Defence Staff, Major General Lucky Irabor, also described the incident as worrisome, but said the military was looking into it with keen interest. The Defence Chief, who did not rule out insider collaboration, said the military authorities would get to the root of the attack.

THISDAY recently reported that a United Nations (UN) publication has detailed a secret government programme tagged, Suhlu, created to pull commanders of terrorists groups, including Boko Haram and the Islamic State for West African Province (ISWAP) out of the forests, rehabilitate them and provide them with a means of livelihood.

The development, according to the exclusive report, is coming at a time intelligence agencies have launched investigation into the recent surrender of over 1,200 terrorists and their families in the last three weeks. The investigation, THISDAY gathered, seeks to establish whether the surrender was genuine or a ploy to activate and coordinate terror sleeper cells across the country.

The planned investigation may have been prompted by different protests by North-east communities, Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), Afenifere and traditional institutions against the potential reintegration of the terrorists/insurgents into different North-east communities.

Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno State, Shehu of Borno, Alhaji Abubakar Umar Garbai El-Kanem and Audu Ogbeh-led ACF raised concerns that the communities where thousands of people were killed by the terrorists and houses destroyed might not be in the right frame of mind to accept the surrendered terrorists, who recently sought the forgiveness of Nigerians.

However, a report by a United Nations’ publication, The New Humanitarian, indicated that a concealed Nigerian government programme was reaching out to senior jihadist fighters in the bush to encourage and inspire them to abandon their deadly activities and their goal of building a caliphate by force of arms, and to defect.

Going by the design, security officials and experts strongly believe that Sulhu could open the door to a “peace deal’’, ending a stalemated conflict/violence that is now in its 12th year. But there is apprehension in some quarters that such a deal would amount to rewarding mass killers and rapists.

According to the UN report, one of the ex-commanders and beneficiary of the Sulhu programme, Aliyu, now has a new life. The old was the decade he spent fighting with Boko Haram and then with the breakaway ISWAP in the scrubland of the North-east.

“In his early thirties, with a wispy goatee, Aliyu has remarried to a forthright woman from the North-eastern city of Maiduguri. She is also former Boko Haram, and they have been set up with the rent-free house in Kaduna, a business license, and a small monthly stipend provided by Nigeria’s domestic spy service, better known as DSS,” the report stated.

The strategy is to get Aliyu to work with security agencies to turn other terrorists and jihadists under a clandestine project known as Sulhu – Arabic for peace-making. It was gathered that the security project is so controversial that no government agent would go on record to discuss it. But Sulhu is applauded by those who designed it – as smart warfare – a means to remove terrorists and senior jihadists from the battlefield more effectively than the stuttering orthodox military campaign. As insider put it, “We have a foolproof concept; it’s working. It’s depleting the enemy’s fighting force.”

But there are reports that the men on the Sulhu programme are almost certain to have been involved in noxious atrocities. They have not been granted a formal amnesty, but they have also not been held to account for any crime committed in a brutal conflict in the past 12 years. The UN reports said it’s a war that has killed 35,000 people – 350,000 if you include the victims of the accelerated humanitarian crisis – and upended the lives of millions more.

Sulhu was said to have emerged out of the behind-the-scenes attempts to free the more than 270 Chibok schoolgirls seized by Boko Haram in 2014. After years of painstaking contact-making through a network of mediators, it may have dawned on the negotiators that not only did they have an opening to secure the release of some of the schoolgirls, but there were also Mujahideen – signalling they might be open to dialogue – a prospective leap forward in a deadlocked conflict.

A total of 150 Mujahideen were said to have surrendered their weapons and crossed over since 2019. To be sure, in the last few weeks, security experts said that there has been a separate surge, related to internal feuding within the jihadist movement following the death this May of Abubakar Shekau, who had led Boko Haram since 2009.

Some of those Mujahideen, like Aliyu, were commanders, known as Qaid – in charge of several districts. Such was the importance attached to the initial group that they were invited to Abuja, where they reportedly met with representatives of President Muhammadu Buhari. Insiders say that under Sulhu, defectors are enrolled in a six-month “deradicalisation” course in the military’s demobilisation and reintegration centre in Mallam Sidi, in North-eastern Gombe State.

After promising to reject violence and be good citizens, they are issued with a graduation certificate, signed by a high court judge – and some of them are said to have to set up businesses, from cap-making to chicken-rearing. Sulhu is run by DSS and the military, but is separate from the army’s much larger disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration initiative, known as Operation Safe Corridor (OSC) and also based in Mallam Sidi.

OSC is aimed at low-risk former combatants, although as many as 75 per cent of those on the programme may never have held a weapon – just villagers snagged in the military’s catch-all dragnets, with years spent in detention without trial. Those on the Sulhu initiative are said to be the turbaned Rijal seen in the low-res YouTube videos, exultant in victory, killing without remorse.

The report indicated that before joining ISWAP, prior to the 2016 split from Boko Haram, these men had been obedient to a maximalist “Takfir” creed, promoted by then-leader Shekau, who declared that anybody living outside their zone of control was an infidel, punishable by death or enslavement.

THISDAY reported recently that more than 1,000 Boko Haram fighters have surrendered to the army in the last few weeks – handing over the weapons they carried. ISWAP is militarily on the front foot, but there can be exhaustion with the years of conflict for any number of reasons, explained a Nigeria-based researcher, who asked not to be named so they could speak freely.

“Some [defectors] have lost faith in their leaders, accusing them of corruption; some have even forgotten why they were fighting; others just want their children to go to school,” the report revealed.

However, analysts said that allowing terrorists and jihadists to return to civilian life is clearly problematic. The military’s far more limited OSC initiative, resettling low-risk Boko Haram, has run into a wall of criticism – including from some senior politicians, who misrepresent Mallam Sidi as a holiday resort, where “killers” are pampered; and there’s no appetite from the government to even begin to publicly discuss Sulhu.

According to an insider, “There’s a lack of buy-in and a lot of pushback from sections of the military and political office holders, who don’t see the need for this process.” Yet, the report indicated that ‘’almost 60 per cent’’ of people surveyed across the northeast in 2018 said they could agree to reconciliation with repentant terrorists and jihadists if that was a path to peace: though acceptance was far lower in areas hardest hit by the conflict, and among women – the victims of so much sexual violence.

However, in spite of the expected good results of the security project, there are sound minds – security experts who believe that a more effective strategy should be one that is steered by the country’s interests; fashioned by convincing valuations of the nation’s challenges and its capacities; and in agreement to the central roles of the country’s allies – in the global shared counterterrorism efforts.

The argument is that the new strategy should adopt a more responsive and spread-out approach that speaks to the full gamut of terrorist threats to Nigeria: in which the nation’s security agencies should take into consideration, how to also confront the threat of terrorists who seek to further their political or social aims through unlawful acts of violence, so that the security agents can continue to protect the nation lawfully, in their resolute obligation to defeat all those who resort to violence in an effort to disrupt or weaken the society.

The deadly actions of terrorists have now made it very imperative for the security agencies to harness the chock-full span of the country’s power and employ every single available tool to battle terrorism in all parts of the country. And analysts say, this should include military and intelligence action, law enforcement actions, diplomatic engagement, and the use of financial tools, modernizing, and securing the country’s borders – through more rigorous scrutiny of entry into the country.

In order to deny them the oxygen of their propaganda, experts have also made a strong case for reinvigoration of the security agencies’ strategic communications.

In addition, a comprehensive strategy may also prioritize an array of non-military competencies, such as the country’s ability to prevent terrorist recruitment in different localities – by improving the well-being of the people – through economic empowerment, jobs creation, education programmes and also diminish the appeal of terrorist propaganda. The security agencies can also leverage on the skills and resources of civil society, the media and other non-traditional institutions to diminish terrorists’ efforts to radicalize and recruit people in the troubled areas.

In particular, the Nigerian media is charged to be mindful of their responsibility in the current collective efforts to address the security challenges in the country. The relationship between the security agencies and the media has been more respectful and trustful on this mission in the past few years and it must be sustained.

Also, considering their influence in their environments, traditional rulers, religious/political leaders and other opinion moulders should be encouraged to speak out forcefully against a detestable ideology that provides the breeding ground for violence and terrorism. This, according to experts, will enable security agencies to uncover the vicious nature of the ideology that fuels violent radical Islamist movements, such Boko Haram and other extremists.

In the same vein, a research work titled ‘’Assembling a Force to Defeat Boko Haram: How Nigeria Integrated the Market into its Counterinsurgency Strategy,’’ by Dr Christopher Kinsey, of Business and International Security at the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London and Dr Andreas Krieg, an assistant professor at the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London currently seconded to the Royal College of Defence Studies, argued that non-state actors can also play a role in resolving the current security challenges in Nigeria.

The defence experts argued that Nigeria can partner with private actors – both commercial and non-commercial, saying with that the state is potentially able to extend its reach and quality in security provision. The scholars explained that private security actors are not necessarily undermining the authority of the state, but rather in assisting the state in providing an essential state function: security for its people.

‘’Particularly, in remote or contested areas, partnerships with local, regional and global non-state actors can augment the capacity and capability of the state’s security sector by increasing its legitimacy as an inclusive security provider.

‘’Global security assemblages, in bringing together the state, local and global security actors with their expertise, norms and experience, can in fact prepare the state for the arguably increasingly complex transnational environment it operates in,” the experts stated.

Postulating that Boko Haram/JAS in many ways has been a symptom of both sentiments of disenfranchisement among Muslims in the northern states of the country, the security scholars submitted that contracting-in a commercial counterinsurgency as a force multiplier helped the country fundamentally change its approach to engaging the insurgents.

However, they were quick to add that security assemblages are only effective in boosting state capacity and capability if the state retains effective control over the non-state actors it partners with.

‘’At a time where authoritarian states such as Russia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) increasingly outsource warfighting to commercial surrogates, the inability of patrons to maintain or enforce surrogate behaviour creates a ticking time-bomb.

‘’The UAE’s loss of control over its surrogates in Yemen, the Southern Transitional Council (STC), is partially due to Abu Dhabi’s large-scale reliance on contractors to exercise command and control over local militia groups.

‘’In Nigeria, without the contractual means to maintain or enforce behaviour, the CJTF has developed into a rogue actor in some areas despite receiving a state stipend, drawing-in criticism for human rights abuses,” the scholars explained.

Apart from commercial surrogates, the defence experts said that vigilante groups and militias can also become a liability rather than an asset within a global security assemblage when their motives deviate from delivering public security towards delivering private security.

The state’s role as an authority controlling the use of force, according to them, does not necessarily challenge the fact that force is provided by a private actor, but it is challenged when this private actor cannot be effectively controlled.

In all these submissions, it is doubtful if the strategies will yield the expected results without robust concerted efforts by the federal, state and local governments.

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In Nigeria, without the contractual means to maintain or enforce behaviour, the CJTF has developed into a rogue actor in some areas despite receiving a state stipend, drawing-in criticism for human rights abuses,” the scholars explained