The Spiritual Solution to Boko Haram
No one is in any doubt that terrorism poses one of the gravest threats to humanity in today’s world. Here in Nigeria, within a decade and a little, unconscionable acts of violence by persons pursuing heinous ideological, religious, and political objectives has resulted in wanton destruction of lives and property, making Nigeria one of the most difficult places to be in the world, especially in the North Eastern part of the country where a notorious group known as Boko Haram holds sway as a local terror group and as a wing of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of the West African Province (ISWAP). The Nigerian government has since adopted a military option to stop the Boko Haram in its tracks and to prevent it from seizing Nigerian territory. Boko Haram has indeed proven to be a threat to the sovereignty of Nigeria and the integrity of the state itself. The Nigerian Government argues that it has been able to “defeat” the group “technically” or “degrade” it but all of that is no more than mere rhetoric. The reality is different and that includes the Boko Haram attacking an Emir’s palace in broad daylight reprisal attack. It includes brazen assault on Nigerian military camps, with Nigerian soldiers, ill-equipped, poorly motivated, war-weary troops, taking to their heels or putting up feeble resistance. Since the crisis began, more than 2,000 lives have been lost and it has been more than 2,000 days since 276 girls were abducted from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno State.
Terrorism being an asymmetrical war, not even the smartest Generals know when or how any war against terror will end. What we know is that Nigeria has a terrible task on its hands, it is like fighting the Devil, in an unknown space, where there are no rules, and the enemy wears a mask. The worst part is the creeping mutation of the security crisis in the country: the crisis keeps spreading like cancer as if the terrorists have engaged independent contractors of their own: bandits in Zamfara, kidnappers in Kaduna, pipeline vandals in the South South, killer-herdsmen from the Middle Belt to Osun and Eastern Nigeria, ritualists, rapists, yahoo yahoo boys in the South West and everywhere else… in one word, we live in a country where the population of rogues appears to be rising and the unusual has become the norm. No serious government will fold its arms and allow a country such as we have to collapse. To that extent, I am in total agreement with our compatriots who argue that the government must adopt multiple approaches in dealing with the country’s security challenge. It may be true after all that intractable problems require desperate solutions, but what is now of interest, in my view, is the latest recourse to a spiritual solution to terrorism and the seriousness with which some highly placed persons are promoting that metaphysical option.
It all started with Nigeria’s Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai who around September 30, 2019 said at a seminar in Abuja, that clerics within the Nigerian military and religious leaders across the country would need to help the military win the war against terror with the aid of spiritual warfare. The Seminar organized by the Nigeria Army Resource Centre was reportedly titled: “Countering Insurgency and Violent Extremism in Nigeria through spiritual warfare.” Buratai said: “It is easier to defeat Boko Haram and ISWAP terrorists than their ideology because while we degrade the terrorists and their havens, the ideology grows the group. Therefore, communities, families, and groups should join in the fight and narratives to reject and prevent the ideologies of the terrorists and extremist groups. Religious bodies and organizations in particular who interface regularly with the grassroots should be at the forefront of the spiritual battle and fashion out ways of stepping up their roles. The fight against terrorism, Boko Haram and ISWAP as well as other security threats, cannot be left to the troops in the battle field alone.”
This statement drew all kinds of interpretations with the general public wondering why the military would be asking for spiritual warfare. Does it mean that the Nigerian military with all the weapons at their disposal now want to fight terrorists with anointing oil and holy water and amulets and charms? Is Buratai suggesting that we should withdraw military Generals from the frontlines and send the likes of Pastor Enoch Adeboye, Pastor David Oyedepo, Pastor Tunde Bakare, Apostle Johnson Suleiman, Pastor Chris Okotie, Guru Maharaji and all the big Islamic clerics that we can deploy from Agege to Kano to Mali and Senegal? One lawyer has since said Buratai was misinterpreted in what I consider a needless revision. It will be recalled that the same Chief of Army Staff was reported as having said at the commissioning of a remodeled All Saints Military Church at the Maxwell Khobe Cantonment, Rukuba Barracks, near Jos in June, that the military also have spiritual needs! I suspect very strongly that if Buratai were not a soldier, he would probably be a cleric, given the consistency with which he apparently draws attention to the spiritual side of warfare. In a superstitious country such as Nigeria, I do not imagine that there will be too many who will disagree with his views, and it should not be surprising that his focus on spirituality resonates with the people. Nigerians in the 21st Century are basically still living in the Medieval era. Their worldview is dominated by a daily conception of saints and enemies who are trying to do harm, evil spirits lurking in the air, and animism as the sole explanation for natural phenomena.