Militias, said to be mostly Islamic militants, are on the rampage in West Africa and the Sahel.
In
Nigeria Boko Haram, that three years ago looked like it was on the
ropes, for months it has been a killing spree, and its attacks on roads,
bridges, and transmission means it has all but cut off the northeastern
state of Borno from the rest of Nigeria.
In the Sahel,
escalating violence, according to Unicef has forced more than eight
million school-aged children in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger from
school.
Burkina Faso was once of the most peaceful
corners of Africa, with the occasional violence coming from soldiers as
they staged coups among themselves, leaving the masses alone. It was the
land that produces fashionable and beloved revolutionaries like Thomas
Sankara. Not anymore.
Closer home, Somalia militant
group Al-Shabaab, which looked like it was on its last legs four years
ago, is back with a vengeance, sowing terror in Kenya’s northern and
coastal regions.
Some aspects of the violence are
familiar. In Mali, for example, in 2012, Ansar Dine militants linked to
Al-Qaeda, took advantage of a post-coup chaos in the country and
hijacked a Tuareg separatist rebellion in the north. They seized several
towns, including the historical city of Timbuktu.
To the shock of the world, they laid waste to its rich
architectural heritage, torched manuscripts from its famous library
dating back as early as 1204, and an indication of how extreme they
were, destroyed the tomb of a local Muslim saint.
Mali troops eventually took back Timbuktu and most of the region, but thanks largely to the French army.
The present turn of the tide toward militants should be cause for concern, because there are things that are very different.
The
governments in nearly all the countries affected, earned some
democratic credits in recent years, having been elected in free or
near-free elections, so they should have the mandate to fight back.
Indeed,
in Nigeria’s case, President Muhammadu Buhari’s government cashed in
some of his democracy dividend cheques, and used the proceeds to push
Boko Haram back.
Now, it looks like his account has
run dry. It would seem we have reached a point where legitimacy is no
longer a sufficient platform to fight back against militants, in part
because these governments have failed to build up their economies and
stem poverty.
As a result, the states’ inabilities are even more pronounced than they were before, and their diplomatic bankruptcy is starker.
Something bigger
The
leaders from the troubled countries were so terrified when French
President Emmanuel Macron expressed displeasure at anti-French sentiment
in the region, they went and huddled at his feet in Paris, seeking
reassurance he wouldn’t withdraw his army.
Secondly,
even Boko Haram that once sought to turn Nigeria into a Sharia-ruled
country, no longer mouths such ambitions, however misguided they are.
Violence is no longer a means of negotiation for something bigger, with
these groups, it is a currency with which they buy livelihoods or
organise local economic redistribution.
We could be on
the cusp of something very strange in the Sahel; a bunch of armed cattle
herders upset that their animals died in a drought or some angry youth
who were kicked out of a mosque by the sheikh, seizing power!
The author is curator of the “Wall of Great Africans” and publisher of explainer site Roguechiefs.com. Twitter@cobbo3
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