Chad to the rescue

Editorial

There is a new fillip in the war, by a concert of West African countries, against Boko Haram insurgents. But that boost isn’t coming from Nigeria, the biggest in the anti-terror alliance.  It is coming from Chad, about the smallest and least economically endowed.

Still, what Chad lacks in size and economic resource, it makes up for in sheer grit. This is such that the country’s leader, President Idriss Déby, is reported to have personally led his country’s forces, in dealing the heavy hand against the insurgents.

Chadian forces unleashed firepower penultimate week against Boko Haram terrorists, under factional leader Abubakar Shekau, killing about 1000 of the insurgents and seizing an arsenal reported to be the largest owned by the terrorists. The offensive was sequel to an overnight attack by the jihadists on a Chadian military base, on the peninsula of Bomo, in which 92 of the country’s soldiers were slain.

Though not a few claim the Bomo attack was fit comeuppance for Chad (and other Chad Basin neighbours of Nigeria), for alleged earlier indulgence to harbour Boko Haram insurgents in their hit-and-run operations against Nigeria, Déby, a former chief of Chadian army, had bemoaned that attack and vowed not to let it go without reprisal.

It was in line with this vow that Operation Wrath of Bomo was launched, with the Chadian leader reported to have led his country’s forces to battle the terrorists at Kelkoua bank and Magumeri, where they destroyed several Boko Haram bunkers, recovered arms and arrested a top insurgent commander.

At Magumeri, a council area in Nigeria’s Borno State, the Chadian troops reportedly freed some Nigerians held captive by the terrorists.  But the Nigerian military have poured cold water on this claim: “For the avoidance of doubt,” Col. Sagir Musa, the acting director of Army Public Relations told the media on April 10, at the Army Special Super Camp at Ngamdu, Borno State, “the Chadian Operation Boma Wrath took place only in Chadian territory and not on Nigerian territory.”

The Chadian forces also  dislodged hundreds of insurgent fighters in Goje, the Chadian end of Sambisa forest – a stronghold of Boko Haram – to get through to an arms depot reputed to be the terrorists’ largest, which they seized.

The blows were so crushing that Abubakar Shekau, in an audio message, consoled his terror army for their human and material losses, and threatened revenge against the Chadian leader. But President Déby only uttered a snappy retort: surrender or be smoked out  — and killed!

Read Also: I won’t return to Abuja until Boko Haram is defeated – Buratai 

Boko Haram launched its insurgency in Nigeria in 2009 before making incursions into neighbouring countries. It is estimated that the insurgency has killed some 36,000 people and displaced nearly two million in northeastern Nigeria since it began.

The countries around Lake Chad raised a multinational force involving Nigeria, Chad, Cameroun and Niger, which has sustained an onslaught against the terrorists – with Nigerian forces recovering territories previously held by the insurgents. Besides, the recent exploits of the Chadian troops were reportedly with active collaboration by Nigerian soldiers, among others in the Multinational Joint Taskforce (MNJTF).

Still, it is ironic that an insurgency that started out in Nigeria is about being suppressed, as it seems, not by Nigeria but by Chad. Of course, that would be of inconsequence so long as the insurgency is suppressed. We must also commend the heroic exertions of Nigerian troops, to undo the insurgency and keep our country safe from terrorists.

But the moral here is the need for national introspection on how the leader appears to have become the led. Chadian soldiers are leading the way – even on Nigerian territory – only backed up by Nigerian counterparts. In 2015, the New York Times reported Déby lamenting that his soldiers were stuck in Damasak, a town in Borno State, while awaiting Nigerian troops to take over the onslaught against insurgents in the area.

“We want the Nigerians to come and occupy so we can advance…We’re not an army of occupation,” he was quoted saying.

The back-footed position of the Nigerian military in the anti-terror war reflects inadequate equipment and intelligence available for the war, despite the billions spent over the years. The poor state of equipment, in turn, informs the low morale of the forces in fighting the war.

The latest exploits by Chadian troops is another wake-up call on Nigeria to do all that is required to meet international expectations from its military.