Former Military Administrator of Bayelsa State, Col. Edor Obi (rtd), in this interview with INNOCENT DURU, speaks about rising incidents of coups in Africa and how the military should handle recent calls by some unidentified people on social media on the military to intervene in the nation’s political system. Excerpts
Military coup is beginning to rear its head again in Africa. Beyond the reasons given by the coup plotters for taking over, what exactly do you think is amiss?
I think the most interesting thing about the coups in Africa, if you look at Mali, Burkina Faso, Guinea and Niger, if I am not mistaken; all these countries are Francophone countries. That tells you something.
It does appear that there is something that is happening within the Francophone African countries which may have to do with some of their own internal issues.
Let’s take Mali for example. I think the situation in Mali was necessitated by the inability of their government to deal with the prevailing security situation. The fact that you have more of these Francophone countries does appear that there is something there that they are probably revolting against their colonial masters. For me, each of them has unique characteristics in terms of what has necessitated the uprising. But I think what people need to pay attention to is the fact that all these countries are Francophone. I think that there is something that is brewing there that may not be unconnected with the relationship of these countries with their French masters and the policies of the French system in those countries. I think people just need to pay attention and find out what is the root cause of this fundamental thing that is happening in these Francophone countries.
The economy of Africa is obviously being affected by these coups and there is also the challenge of displacement of people. What dangers do these portend for Africa?
Let me talk about people being displaced. I think it is a big problem. If we are going to begin to have refugees that are being displaced in some of these countries, don’t also forget that today as we speak, though I don’t have the statistics but probably most of the migrants around the world come from Africa. It is not just a problem for Africa; I think it is a potential problem for the rest of the world, and that is why Africa also needs to put its house in order.
Right now, even recently, the UK tried to even take a lot of the migrants and resettle them in Rwanda even though I know their parliament voted against that. This problem has big social economic consequences that Africa may not be able to handle and it will have a spillover effect on the rest of the world. From the African perspective, I think it is something we really need to find a solution to and try to stop the trend so that we are not faced with this huge refugee problem in Africa.
We don’t have the capacity to deal with it. We don’t have the economic resources, we don’t have the facilities and we don’t have the means. It will create a ripple effect and even upheavals in some of these countries if we are not able to provide for some of these people. They say a hungry man is an angry man. I think we need to pay attention.
Coming to Niger, we have the ECOWAS on the one hand mobilising troops and the western world who are not comfortable with military coups. What do you think ECOWAS should do considering the position of the West in Niger?
We need to go back to the ECOWAS charter. What was the original intention of ECOWAS? Where does ECOWAS come in as far as this issue of intervening affairs of neighbouring states,? What is the precedent and what is the justification? ECOWAS needs to ensure it follows its own protocol in doing that.
I know that today, we are part of the international community, so, you can be talking about the US interest. But I don’t think ECOWAS should be the tool that the United States is going to use to protect and project its interest in the sub-region. I know the concept of peace-keeping under the United Nation Charter encourages sub-regional bodies to be more involved because of the issue thereof, understanding the culture and the peculiarity of the region under the United Nations arrangement where the UN is beginning to encourage sub-regional involvement in peacekeeping operations and not military operations.
If we are talking about the United Nations solution, I can say fine, the ECOWAS can work under because the UN will support by providing logistics and a lot of other things so that Africa or ECOWAS troops may be involved in keeping the peace. But if you are talking about military operations to invade a sovereign nation, I think ECOWAS needs to look at its charter.
My take is that it is something that ECOWAS needs to be very careful about. Personally, I don’t think it is the best option. I am not sure that if ECOWAS is going to do that now, it is going to be that easy from the military point of view, because in this kind of operation, you have to be very clear about what you intend to achieve. It has to be clear in terms of the timeline, the resources you need and how that operation is going to be carried out.
If we look at where Niger is located today, I think they share a border with Burkina Faso. If today, Burkina Faso is hostile and is against a possible ECOWAS military intervention in Niger, then you probably need to think twice because you may not just be dealing with Niger alone. You probably will have to contend with those neigbours that are not supporting ECOWAS. If you are going to get into Niger, you are not going to go through the land borders. That will require strategic airlift to be able to get to that ground.
Don’t forget that there is also a no flight zone which is already in place. It is really going to be a complex operation that I don’t think we have the resources at this point to want to do. And as usual Nigeria is presently the chairman of ECOWAS. We do have our own internal issues today. We are actually biting more than we can chew because since the civil war, I don’t think we have ever had this kind of internal security operations where our troops are almost in 90 per cent of the federation today. What is the force level you are going to need to go to Niger?
The other day I heard the president of Cote D’ivoire saying that he was going to commit a battalion. I don’t know what is the force level. If he is talking about a battalion and I heard him say a battalion for three months. For me, it is like he is putting the cart before the horse. I don’t know if they have determined the troop requirement. So, if he is contributing a battalion, what is the force level they are going to need? Where are they going to take the rest of the troops?
In Nigeria, if you are going to take out troops from anywhere here, you are going to create an internal gap that will also compound our own internal problems. Don’t forget that while we are focusing today on our internal insurrection, with terrorism, with Boko Haram and the rest of them, if we go and create a gap, we could also expose ourselves externally and could also be facing external threats. We don’t want to fight on too many fronts and I think we really need to be careful. Military option in Niger for now, for me, should be on the back seat. I think they should explore all the diplomatic options, and I am sure they will succeed. And I think what they need to do is actually engage these people and talk them through what they intend to do and whatever programme they have. They should try and engage them so that, that programme is not an extended programme and they can come to an amicable solution without putting the troops in Niger.
What do you make of the calls for coup in Nigeria by some people on social media?
I love my country and I don’t think that with whatever it is that I want to be one of those who will be supporting a military coup in Nigeria. Personally, I will say it is a no no. We have had a taste of military rule and in my opinion, seriously speaking, and I am not trying to speak like a politician, I am speaking strictly as somebody who loves this country, we should let our democracy evolve. Each time there is an intervention, we are going to start the process all over. We are not there yet in our democracy. We are not practising democracy as we should, but interrupting the democratic process is actually not the best option. It is actually going to set us back in terms of learning the ropes. For now, I will strongly advocate that we should be focusing on governance, building our institutions and letting our leadership also live up to its responsibility so that they are not living under this shadow of disillusion that they would be afraid of this kind of thing.
With good governance, I don’t think you really need to bother yourself, because the populace will really kick against any such thing. Let’s be focusing more on trying to have governance, strong institutions and deepen our democracy than this frequent interruption.
We just talked about the challenge of refugees around the world. Nigeria is the centre of gravity of Africa. If Nigeria is not together, Africa cannot stand. If we have internal insurrection where you have this kind of instability and there is a spillover effect to the rest of Africa, the whole of West Africa together cannot absorb the refugees from Nigeria. Let us try and stabilise Nigeria by making sure that our democracy thrives.
Beyond warning people against talking about coups, what should the military be doing at this point?
The military should just focus on its constitutional responsibility. We are living in a democracy and people are entitled to their freedom of expression. But there is also a line, because if people are instigating a military coup and it is credible, then that in itself, going by the laws of this country, is treasonable. So, it is a serious issue. It is not beer parlour talk. I think it is something we need to be careful about.
While individuals are entitled to their freedom of expression, if people begin to make unguarded utterances that they are instigating the military, I think the military should stay focused on what they need to do so that they are not dragged into reacting to this type of thing. I saw somewhere that the military issued a statement but beyond that, they should just stay on their responsibility.
There are necessary agencies to deal with those kinds of thing. If you play into the hands of some of these people, it may actually boomerang. We should make sure that people act responsibly, and if they don’t, I think the laws are there to deal with such situations.
Shouldn’t the military be looking inward to see if there are officers with such plans?
I don’t think the military should bother itself with those kinds of thing. I think the military as an institution knows exactly the way it is structured. The military the way it is structured, should just focus on its primary responsibilities. And this includes internal insurrections, and external aggression.
Internal insurrection will come in different forms. The military has its own means of information and intelligence gathering. The military is not going to devour the units to begin to look at the people who are asking for military intervention. They are not going to do that. The military will focus on doing what they need to do, but they will do it in a structured manner without losing their focus on what they need to do to defend this country externally and also make sure they support the country internally.
Security challenges in the country are not abating. What is the way out of this beyond deployment of troops in troubled areas?
People always think that in issues that have to do with insecurity, the military should be the first port of call. I think it is a very wrong notion. I did a course in 2013 in Harvard on National and International Security, and you will find out that the military component of national security is probably less than 20 per cent. You have to find out what are the factors that are creating this, and you cannot take away the economy. We need to focus on turning around the economy. The level of unemployment is very high. We have a lot of our graduates and youths that are unemployed. Unemployment leads to a lot of other social consequences. They start getting involved in drugs.
Take for example the cases of kidnapping that have become a big business in Nigeria. Some of the youths have been drawn into this because they don’t have a choice. If you take for example the situation in the Niger Delta where people were disrupting operations and the rest of it, the restiveness has to do with, again, environmental consequences which made it impossible for the people to fish and farm and so they couldn’t go to school. Those who went to school couldn’t get jobs and because of that they didn’t have a means of livelihood and consequently became available tools to be used by different gangs for these criminal activities.
I think we need to begin to look at those fundamental issues and address them. Unless we address those issues, there is only a limit to which you can deploy the military. The military can only do containment like they are trying to do. In the long term internally, it becomes a lot more complex for them to deal with some of these situations. These are all Nigerians in Nigeria. They are not enemies of the state. Some of them are committing crimes, yes, which are punishable under the law. But there is also a limit to which they can use the military against them. If you overuse the military, even the so-called international community will come back and tell you that you are violating human rights because they are your own people.
The government needs to be responsive and look at these fundamental issues and fix them. The government needs to do its own bit to reduce this social inequality and create an enabling environment, reduce the poverty gap and create jobs particularly for our teeming youth.
The government should also make sure the economy is productive. Using the military alone and even the cost of maintaining the military to keep the peace is already eating into the economy.
What do you make of the resolve of Senate that Nigeria should extradite Simon Ekpa, the Finland based Biafran agitator?
I don’t have details of what the Senate said and what his offences are. But again, there are processes. If this person has committed an offence against his country, I think there is a process. It is not just because the Senate is calling for it. I think the relevant agencies will be working towards that once it is established that he is instigating insurrection in his own country. I am sure it is not just the Senate that will call for it. In every responsible country, the relevant agencies and organs of government will be working with other international bodies to deal with such a situation, and I think that is the way to go because the world today is a global village and we are part of the international community.
