Bandits are terrorists – No ifs, no buts

If anyone was under any illusion about the serious threat the brutal groups in the North West pose, last weekend alone should be enough to cure them. With their murdering of 13 policemen, an attempt on a military camp and the shooting down of a military jet – all within hours, the so-called bandits have declared an all-out war on Nigeria. And this is only the latest evidence that the groups in the North West have transitioned from organised crime to outright terrorism.

The weekend saw a string of horrific attacks led by a notorious kidnapper called Gudda Turji on more than half a dozen villages in Zamfara, razing them, killing many people and abducting over 150 others. The kidnap kingpin unleashed his terror as a retaliation for the arrest of his father days prior, which he blamed on intelligence from the villagers. Meanwhile, the security forces knew that he was going to attack unarmed civilians in response. It has been bandits’ practice for some time. But no plan was put in place to protect the communities which may have provided the tip that led to the arrest. That is criminally reckless and it is precisely what is discouraging civilians from cooperating with security and intelligence agencies. Why will they provide information when they know they will be abandoned to the criminals?

This was followed on Sunday by another milestone when 13 police officers were killed in an ambush and five were injured in Zamfara. As if killing and grievously wounding a dozen and a half cop is not a red flag enough, a Nigerian Air Force jet was shot down hours later in the same area. Thankfully, the pilot escaped unhurt by ejecting from the jet and escaping into a community, but the fact that bandits have acquired anti-aircraft weapons turns my stomach. It is clear from the activities and statements of these groups that they have transitioned from criminality to terrorism.

From last December when they launched their mass kidnapping of students, bandits’ demands have expanded from ransoms in cash or kind, to the release of fellow gang members in detention, to stopping military operations against them, to scrapping vigilantes. In some videos, they said they picked up weapons because they were excluded from development and demanded the building of schools, return of grazing reserves and other infrastructure. This is precisely the definition of terrorism: the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence by a non-state actor to attain a political, economic, religious, or social goal.

But it is not just their statements and demands: even their methods scream ‘terrorism’. They have completely razed hundreds of villages in Zamfara, Katsina, Kaduna, Niger, Sokoto and Kebbi, killing thousands including children. They have kidnapped thousands and extorted billions of naira in ransom. Over the past eight months, they have abducted more than 1,000 students and their teachers from schools across five different states in eight separate incidents. More than 300 of these children are still in their grip. These are the 136 students seized from Tegina, some as young as five, who have now spent 52 long days in the hands of their captors; the more than 50 boys and girls taken from BirninYauri