About four months after over 200 school girls were abducted in Chibok, Borno State, by Boko Haram insurgents, the founder, Omoluabi Network, Pastor Ladi Thompson, shares his thoughts with reporters in Lagos. It turned out an emotional encounter, reports DADA ALADELOKUN.
It was an event to seek divine intervention in the plight of the innocent school girls abducted in Chibok, Borno State, over four months ago by Boko Haram insurgents. Tears flowed freely on the occasion.
Reporters, who were there to get the latest about the girls, also caught the bug of fellow-feeling that momentarily tortured the man in Ladi Thompson, activist pastor and founder, Omoluabi Network, a non-governmental humanitarian body.
“Who is that sane human being in this country today that is not worried to the marrow over the abuse and bondage of those children is languishing helplessly in God-knows-where? How about their traumatised parents? Why won’t one cry one’s heart out as a parent?” He asked as he went into momentary soliloquy of prayers for the girls. It was at his organisation’s Lagos office.
Breaking his seeming silence over the girls’ “100 days in captivity and the future of Nigeria,” Thompson said: “The case of the Chibok girls is a grave concern that is of paramount importance to the history of a Nigeria. The issue must not be a platform for inconsiderate adventurism, political jobbery or insensitive mockery. It should be about concern for the missing girls, those who were kidnapped before and after them, their grieving parents and those that have died because of the shock; the relatives that have developed illnesses and diseases including psychological disorders and the ravaged communities that have been under siege since then.
He said: “As a nation we must be educated to know that the satanic device that has swallowed our girls for 100 days is not in the same boat as the problems that were solved by Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jnr and other heroes of the non-violence advocacy. While there is need for us to pressure our government to acknowledge the satanic war form that is threatening our national future, it must not be done in way to deride or denigrate the Nigerian president, his government and the noble soldiers of the Nigerian Armed Forces. The real problem behind the Chibok attack is a different kettle of fish and cannot be resolved with a wrong medicine.”
Affirming that the insurgents are Islamist ideologues seeking to destroy the Nigerian state to eradicate women’s rights, the political vote and religious plurality, he said that the mixture of global resurgence of Islamism with an ancient strain in the country is what produced the venomous hybrid known as the Boko Haram.
He described Boko Haram is an “unrelenting, fascistic, vicious and amoral socio-economic-judicial-militaristic-financial-cultural-linguistic hydra, which is masked in a religious garb.
“The level of intelligence at which this war is being waged seems to beyond the ability of the Nigerian mind! There are nations that would readily sponsor any group that will weaken the Nigerian government and divide opinions in the nation. I dare say that the “Bringbackourgirls” campaign needs to reconsider its strategy because the Boko Haram intelligentsia may have encouraged Shekau to taunt them publicly in order to help their campaign,” he said.
The destiny of the kidnapped girls, he feared, is a pointer to the future of Nigeria if decisive actions are not taken in time, adding: “Creative campaigns have to be mounted to pressure the President Goodluck Jonathan-led government fully recognise the fact that we are in state of war. We need to evacuate all civilians from the war zone and concentrate on crushing the menace speedily.
“Jonathan must be pressured into building bridges across all political divides and persuasions to forge an accord that can dispassionately solve this problem. He must create new machinery that will systematically weed out all the moles and compromised persons in high places. The new machinery must remove the religious cover of the Boko Haram to free the average Nigerian Muslim from needless pressure and join in the task of nation building.”
Advising Nigerians to look inwards and stop expecting salvation from their colonial lords or any other world power, Thompson explained: “While there is no doubt that the southern half of Nigeria worships the very ground that Americans tread upon, we need to do a critical assessment as to whether the love is reciprocal. We must accept the fact that a large expanse of northern Nigeria worships the Arab culture with equal fervour.”
“The mysterious dealings of the US state department in Nigeria have not helped matters either. Up until 2012, they seemed to see Boko Haram as a freedom-fighting group and they fought tooth and nail to prevent its Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO) designation. Nigerians have to accept that salvation cannot come from abroad. Instead of tearing down and disrespecting Jonathan, we need to encourage, strengthen and pressure him to action.”
“We expect the president to offer all his political opponents the olive branch so that individuals like the Osun State governor and many other Nigerian assets can work together on the same table. Governor Rauf Aregbesola in particular had been shouting himself hoarse on the danger that the unattended almajiris’ problems would eventually trouble Nigeria. But all hope is not lost,” he added.
As a solution, Thompson said: “We must call for a formal recognition of the declaration of war that Boko Haram has been waging and suspend all political activities for a season to focus on defending the integrity of our nation and restoration of value to human worth. Nigeria should be the site where the global resurgence of Islamism will meet its Waterloo.”
He, however, warned: “If we ignore the ominous signs in the horizon, Nigeria will be taken by surprise and the curtains will be drawn on the hopes of the West Africa’s giant.”
Thompson, who said the Boko Haram won’t ever be totally defeated until the monster of corruption is tackled in Nigeria, urged the nation to come up with a partnership between government and the grassroots to engineer an Africanised socio-cultural solution to the monster. “By so doing, we will also carpet the dubious foreign interests that wish to distract Nigeria from the true nature of the Boko Haram,” he added.
“Bodies like the Gabasawa Women & Children’s Initiative,” he advised, “should be encouraged because they have served in the North Eastern states for more than a decade, sponsoring children and comforting victims irrespective of creed, tongue or religious persuasions. Applying love with skill and applying pressure with surgical precision we shall surely overcome.”
