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Yeah Yeah Hypocrites aint they!
Is it known for sure who is Boko Haram's leader?
The IMF/Anglo-Dutch government of President Goodluck Jonathan is using a spate of terrorist bombings to justify measures aimed at countering the developing social threat to its rule.
Boko Haram feeds on deep-seated grievances in the predominantly Muslim north, which suffers discrimination and high levels of poverty. But it is a nebulous organisation, and there is no way of proving its actual size or the scale of its activities.
The Kano bombings took place just four days after the ending of a general strike involving millions of workers against the (British) IMF's elimination of fuel subsidies.
Boko Haram and other Islamist tendencies share with the Jonathan’s regime a deep hostility to a mass movement in which class questions came to the fore and cut across efforts on both sides to divide the people along religious lines. The instigation of terrorist acts by provocateurs cannot be ruled out.
The Jonathan regime has stoked up sectarian tensions since coming to office last year, in order to divert attention from the widening gulf between the Nigerian super-rich and millions who live in deep poverty. It claimed the general strike was being infiltrated by Boko Haram, claiming that the nation faced a worse threat from the group than the civil war of the 1960s that cost over a million lives.
Today the Wahhabi bros like Al Jazeera are on the right side of history in formenting chaos across Africa because the Hegemon and its media think that they have co-opted their Wahhabis in the broader geo-strategy.
The Right Honourable Wilson didn't put a gun to Nigeria's independence political leadership and force them to mishandly the Ogoni grievances the way they did neither did they do anything to mitigate a violent uprising. So beyond drawing a border and leaving the locals to work it out themselves don't drag the colonials into the pitfalls of a post independence government's affairs.
No Kimena, but he supplied 85% of the weapons to the Nigerian Army during the Biafran War. His Government demanded that Nigeria must stay together when many Nigerians, not just Biafrans, want to go their own way. The Wilson Government provided diplomatic support to the Nigerian Government when they were persecuting the Igbos and over a million people starved to death. Britain did draw the border around Nigeria, but they did not allow the locals to work it out themselves.
"NEARLY 180 people were killed on Friday in Nigeria's second largest city, Kano, in attacks on eight government security buildings by Boko Haram, a radical Islamist sect... In August a suicide bomber hit the UN headquarters in Abuja killing 25 people and injuring dozens more. On Christmas Day a series of attacks, including a bomb at a church outside Abuja, killed 37 people…"
Hundreds of innocents and officials are murdered by Islamists. Hundreds!... and until this post is placed only 13 posts were placed on this board. 13, and this article was published three days ago!
Get an article where Jewish settlers uproot some olive tries belonging to a Palestinian, and within a day you'll get over a hundred comments, attacking Israel in the name of 'human rights violations', 'terrorizing' people, etc.
But here – systematic murder campaign against non-Muslims, government officials, and …. Merely 13 comments only, not one from the many who are quick to jump on any opportunity to bash Israel.
Poor innocent Nigerians. If only Jews were involved in their death, then they would get the world attention..
The Economists articles on Africa generate far less feedback than articles on the Middle East crisis. Chill out man.
Organized campaign to mass murder people shouldn't be a matter for territory, or who's involved. Murder is murder is murder!
I assure you that if in anyway Jews or Israelis were involved, no matter where it is, attention would skyrocket.
"Chill out Man". No!
Yeah Yeah Hypocrites aint they!
Another Curse of the Oil riches on ordinary folks. The Bros up in the North may want to control the oil which is in the Christian South.
There is no such thing as a 'Christian South'. There are muslim governors in the south west as there are christian governors in the north. Do not be susceptible to such a simplistic explanation of Nigeria's issues.
Such problems cannot be solved by the army. This people are very hard to trace with a centralized force. There is also ideological conviction by those who are engaged in these acts (they believe what they are doing is just - I think brainwashing plays important role). The government should rather empower moderate Muslims living in the area to win the propaganda war against Boko Haram. National Muslim figures should also be encouraged to come out and denounce the attacks (they may in return need protection from the state). This will help drain the Boko haram off young followers. Then use local cadres who know the local situation to hunt down the Boko Haram criminals.
Your views seem rooted in postcolonial theory, whose proponents just can't accept that Africans have any responsibility for our own development and socio-economic advancement. But one key weakness of the theory is that it gained currency at a time before the East Asian tigers (most of whom are also ex-colonies) destroyed its validity by achieving spectacular levels of development, as I noted earlier. You don't seem to have an answer to that, by the way, or indeed, to any of the points I raised - which doesn't surprise me at all, because even in your personal life, if you condition your mind to believe that your problems are always invariably caused by someone else, you naturally can't notice your own flaws, however debilitating.
At any rate, even if you were right, neither of us can alter the fact that the history of mankind, whether we like it or not, has been one of conquest, subjugation, and of exploitation. The Brits themselves have suffered a similar fate at the hands of the Romans, the Vikings, and the Normans, in fact. And, if we were in a position to do so, don't tell me we might not have been tempted to colonize them instead. You either look ahead or you rot in the past. And this isn't a matter of opinion: it's just the way it is.
If Harold Wilson's Government had not forced their colonial creation, Nigeria, to remain as one country in the late 1960s, all this could have been avoided. Muslims could have had their own state, Biafra could have been a viable state and the Yorubas in South West Nigeria could have gone thir own way, almost everybody happy.
I have started an online e petition demanding the UK Government apologise for it's complicity in the Biafran War, if you agree, you can sign it at http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/4662
The gulf between a "citizen" in Nigeria and the government is a vast. The dire economic situation an average Nigerian finds themselves in, relative to the revenues hauled in by the country's oil exports, is baffling. The corruption that has plagued the country since shortly after independence has become endemic. Personal and property security remains a fragile affair. Yet, the entrepreneurial spirit that continues to pulsate across the country and the ability of the average man/woman to survive against these towering odds is simply astounding. Evolution continues apace, even if contorted into seemingly unnatural forms. As is often the case with many an African story, the contrasting contradictions are perplexing with plenty to protest and be horrified about and an equal dose to exalt and inspire. The ethnic tensions are vastly exaggerated and used by political manipulators (in government and sects) to further their short-sighted agendas. Violence is all too often used as a means that eclipses/disrupts any sensible ongoing dialogue or community cohesion. Growing up in Nigeria I had friends from all tribes and we enjoyed our companionship immensely. And with the few that one did not get along with, the real divide was never attributed to tribe or religion, but just common human perceptions of one or the other being a jerk. My situation was hardly unique (at least for my generation). At the root of the problem is the feeling of disenfranchisement too many a youth feels with respect to self-growth and economic improvement and the country creating an environment that supports such growth. The disconnect between Western education and Islamic education is another matter entirely, but a convenient excuse that many an Islamic radical would easily resonate with and no doubt lubricates and extends the reach of funding funnels to the sect as a result.
western education is a sin.
My only surprise, as a Nigerian, is that there is still a place called "Nigeria" (for it has never been a country in any normal sense at all) for this murderous gang to attack, given how misgoverned this place has been since decolonization. On my frequent visits home from abroad, I often wonder, for example, how our longsuffering people survive without functioning public institutions or infrastructure of any kind. If you want a half-decent education for your kids, you make your private arrangements; if you want electricity, you generate it yourself, etc. The only connection between the government and the people are the ubiquitous "police" checkpoints, which you'd be well advised to avoid if you can, for those who man them are mostly barely literate, drug-addled, often drunk, ill-trained, ill-equipped, and ill-disciplined, armed brutes whose only raison detre is to extort bribes from innocent citizens.
If we'd set out, post-independence, in some bizarre experiment, to demonstrate to the world how far we could misgovern ourselves, I'm not sure we'd have been more successful. Even the notion of democratic governance (imposed by the aid agencies and donor governments, by the way, not something our rulers would have willingly embraced) has become a curse, as each kleptocrat does his best to appeal to tribal and pseudo-religious allegiances, instead of taking steps to alleviate our people's misery. And this is precisely why we have this death-cult called Boko Haram (the Islamic north's own ghoulish bargaining chip), whose dislike for Western education apparently doesn't extend to its by-products, such as bombs and guns, the motorcar (for their bombing runs), and the internet (for their so-called propaganda). Still, as abhorrent as this might sound to any civilized reader, there is a certain logic (if only of the macabre variety) to Boko Haram's reasoning: if the Nigeria we have today is a function of Western education, then to hell with such an education.
Mind you, I haven't yet seen any flags or effigies burnt in affected righteous rage by any Muslim in the world against this unprovoked massacre of Christians. Common Muslims, prove me wrong - or is yours no longer the religion of peace?
To what extent do you think that the problems faced by Nigeria, which you have eloquently expounded, are a direct result of British colonialism and to what extent are they "home grown"?
VIVE_CHIMIE: Thanks for kind words, though I suspect you won't like my answer, which is that it is 101% "home grown."
To begin with, we've had half a century now (with the added bonus of aboundant oil reserves) to reverse any damage done by colonialism. But you don't have to be a Maths professor to realize that if you take $500 billion out of any economy (which is approximately what our rulers have so far stolen - and it's probably much higher), you'll have nothing left for schools and hospitals.
Secondly, outside of Africa, there are very few (if any) ex-colonies that haven't begun to make some progress towards achieving economic development. Indeed, some, like Singapore (which had broadly the same characteristics as Ghana at independence but without Ghana's resources), is now one of the wealthiest on the planet, per capita. Nearby Malaysia is not too far behind. Even Indonesia, which, not so long ago, was a sewer of corruption and misrule, is now powering ahead. Closer to home, tiny Botswana has shown us how to turn a natural resource into a blessing, though with relatively limited success. Yet, here we are, still debating how to provide pipe-borne water and elctricity to our longsuffering people. Need I say more?
When an mighty Empire such as britain leaves a former colony to rule itself usually takes care true democracy not to be the form of goverment of the new country. It is a lot easier to establish a puppet goverment accesible to adopt policies in exchange for money. It is harder to do that with a democracy because power is dispersed in a very large number of people and buy all these wills are a lot more expensive. So, I disagree with your view in the sense that the problems of Nigeria are home grown.
The security approach doesn't depend on the military. In fact, the military should, at most, come in at the very end. What it depends on is intelligence -- finding out what the militants are planning and disrupting that. In that context, simply arresting known members, however satisfying, is not all that useful. It may be the right thing to do in some cases, but in otherswhat is needed is to watch and listen, to find out who else they work with and what plans they are making.
Sure, let's appease terrorists to stop the violence. What could go wrong?
The Red Revolution is dead. NO one really is a proponent for Communism-- not even Russia.
However the Green Revolution has replaced it. Exporting violence and carnage to coerce converts.
It is the Green Revolution of International Militant Islamic Jihad. And it is no less bloody. And as close as your downtown, airport, marketplace, or home.
Study front page news headlines of international media for the past ten or 20 years. There is a War hidden in plain sight.
Incredibly many Westerners do not realize it.
This is no different than the Cold War of NATO vs the Warsaw Pact. An existential threat. But with Bombs, Weapons of Mass Destruction, and Terrorist hijacking, instead of artillery, tanks and missiles.
And it follows NO GENEVA CONVENTION LAW: City streets are bombed, Schools bomb, Mother and Children are targeted, buses, trains and airliners.
But a powerful spell has been cast.
...And Denial is not just a river in Egypt.
All this is just Cionist propaganda. Islam is the religion of peace, therefore Muslim extremists have to be extremely peaceful. Logical, no? It's probably Mossad and CIA and Blackwater agents in Muslim disguise stirring up trouble. Ask any Muslim, he will tell you it's the truth!
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