Insecurity: A Great Retardation to Peace and Progress (Part 3)

Introduction

Recently, we delved into some of the known causes of insecurity in Nigeria, such as; unemployment, imbalance in security decisions/solutions, border control, etc. Today, we shall x-ray some of the ways to reduce the causes of insecurity. Please, read on.

Restoration/Reintegration Challenges

Although Operation Safe Corridor has made a valuable attempt to offer low-risk fighters a way out of extremist groups, it suffers from significant shortcomings. A more effective DDDR (Disarmament Deradicalisation Demobilisation Reintegration) strategy in northeast Nigeria, would have been much larger in scope to match the scale and urgency of the problem. Yet, these restoration or reintegration efforts face five particular challenges which will be discussed below.

1. Clarifying Eligibility

In most conventional DDDR contexts, peace agreements lay out the eligibility criteria for amnesty and rehabilitation. In Colombia, for example, the peace accord with the FARC guerrilla movement established a tiered system: rank-and-file fighters are eligible for amnesty, provided that they were not involved in war crimes or crimes against humanity, while those who exercised command responsibility or were otherwise implicated in serious crimes have to stand trial.

In Northeast Nigeria, the absence of a peace agreement means that it is not easy to determine who should be eligible for rehabilitation, on what criteria and on what terms. The Nigerian Government has, at various times, floated the idea of a general amnesty to incentivise defections and a cessation of hostilities. Yet, many communities in the region oppose such a deal, unless it also provides for the victims of the conflict. President Muhammadu Buhari’s most recent announcement that the “Government is ever ready to accept the unconditional laying-down of arms by any member of the Boko Haram group”, once again triggered pushback from civil society groups who argue that a general amnesty will perpetuate impunity. At the same time, channeling thousands of detainees through the criminal justice system will likely create further backlog and delays. Because many of the alleged insurgents were arrested based on questionable intelligence and denunciations by local militia groups, the prosecutable evidence against them is scant or nonexistent.

A practical example is an initial round of secretive mass trials launched in late 2017 and early 2018 reportedly resulted in 250 convictions, while approximately a thousand people were ordered to be “released for rehabilitation” because of lack of evidence. According to the Ministry of Justice in Gombe State, some of these Defendants had been held without trial since 2010.

A more realistic alternative would be to expand the current two-track system:

(a) a rehabilitation path opened to low-risk fighters and persons associated with Boko Haram (whether or not they have defected),

(b) a criminal justice path for higher-risk combatants and commanders.

Doing so will require the Joint Investigations Committee, which oversees the military vetting process, to establish more consistent, reliable, and transparent screening criteria to determine an individual’s level of risk and degree of affiliation with the group, ideally subject to oversight by human rights experts. Also, International partners are currently working with Nigerian authorities to establish databases that will help Government agencies capture and share information about all individuals processed through the system, including in the initial screening phase. This certainly brings hope to everyone, in that, such a database will also help speed up and improve the verification of information provided by detainees. Yet, ultimately, the Government must ensure greater policy coherence: a strategy aimed at rehabilitating defectors will have limited impact, as long as the military detains thousands of suspects with only tenuous ties to Boko Haram.

It is pertinent to note again that, any effort to establish systematic screening criteria has to grapple with the complexity of people’s relationships to extremist groups, as well as the difficulties of collecting and corroborating information in a context of ongoing conflict. Some Boko Haram members willingly joined the group, yet later were unable to leave; some were forcibly abducted. Many others’ pathways fall somewhere in between volition and coercion, with social and economic pressures playing significant roles; and although some played active combat roles, others filled various nonviolent support functions under duress, or merely lived under Boko Haram rule, having been unable or unwilling to flee. Erasing these nuances – for example, by referring to those who merely lived in Boko Haram-controlled areas as “repentant Boko Haram members,” and by grouping them with low-risk Boko Haram associates – risks reinforcing stigmatisation and fuelling the misconception that Operation Safe Corridor is apparently an amnesty for violent terrorists.

2. Tackling Deradicalisation

A second challenge deals with the relationship between countering violent extremism (CVE), and rehabilitating Boko Haram fighters and associates.

However, the striking question will be, what type of de-radicalisation programs should be included in rehabilitation efforts to minimise chances of recidivism?

Merging deradicalisation measures into DDDR process is a relatively new field of practice, with little rigorous evidence to support particular efforts or initiatives. Yet, a number of emerging findings from the CVE field may nevertheless, help guide more effective programming.

A typical case in Nigeria, the 2014 National Security Strategy called for a “soft approach” to counterterrorism that would include, as part of a comprehensive CVE strategy, a prison-based deradicalisation process for sentenced and pretrial prisoners, as well as after-care for those released by the courts or through an amnesty. One prison-based deradicalisation program was piloted in 2015, consisting of religious reeducation, vocational and language training, sports, art therapy, and psychosocial support for forty-five Boko Haram affiliates. Yet despite tentative positive results, other prisons do not appear to have expanded or replicated this program. Operation Safe Corridor includes a similar mix of deradicalisation programs for low-risk defectors, though current programming seems to emphasise religious retraining over other services.

Research suggests that radicalisation and entry into extremist groups, tends to be a highly individualised process. It often results from a combination of structural “push” factors like relative deprivation or political grievances, and “pull” factors like appealing ideologies, charismatic recruiters, and material or social benefits. Interviews with former Boko Haram members echo these insights: some young people joined to deepen their religious knowledge, whereas others saw the group as a pathway to get ahead economically. Many highlight the influence of friends, relatives, and colleagues.

Ideally, deradicalisation programming should thus, be individually tailored: not all those who need rehabilitation also need deradicalisation or religious retraining. For those who played minor roles within the groups or joined for nonreligious reasons, obtaining training and psychosocial support to make a transition back to civilian life is most crucial. For those radicalised and recruited through social networks, deradicalisation efforts may be more effective if delivered jointly to relatives or peer groups, rather than in isolation. However, proper program tailoring requires in-depth information and monitoring of all program participants, which in turn demands greater resources, staff training, and capacity. At the moment, for instance, international assistance providers know little about the backgrounds and deradicalisation needs of those detained in military facilities. Systematic record-keeping on all those passing through the system – including those cleared for rehabilitation and those awaiting trial – will be essential for deradicalisation programs to succeed.

Another insight from past deradicalisation efforts is, the importance of credible interlocutors and detention conditions. Government officials or religious figures who detainees do not trust to speak on religious questions are unlikely to be in a position to challenge extremist narratives, not least because hereditary religious hierarchies and government abuses have been important drivers of radicalisation. Anecdotal evidence from Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, as well as from the pilot deradicalisation program in Kuje Prison in Nigeria, suggests that fostering trust and mentoring relationships between detainees and program officials can increase the likelihood of positive behavioural and ideological change. Abusive prison or detention conditions, by contrast, have been shown to increase the likelihood of radicalisation. These findings underscore the risks of the current system, in which many detainees are subjected to prolonged pretrial detention periods in difficult and abusive conditions. Lastly, post-release support and monitoring is likely to be essential to prevent retaliatory attacks, marginalisation, or a return to violence.

1. Preparing for Sustainable Reintegration

Another suggestion is the reintegration of former combatants into civilian life, is often the weakest link of DDDR programs. Whereas dissociation and demobilisation involves a set of relatively standardised activities, reintegration has multiple complex and decentralised transitions, from helping combatants rebuild civilian identities, to strengthening interpersonal trust and restoring livelihoods in war-affected communities. Ongoing conflict further complicates reintegration: civilians are more likely to distrust returnees and defectors when the militant group itself remains active, and returnees themselves may be at risk of retaliatory violence.

Despite these risks, Operation Safe Corridor currently lacks a clear reintegration component. Low-risk detainees have been released back into IDP camps with little preparation or follow-up; others appear to have been held in continued detention at the Gombe facility, even after completing deradicalisation programming out of fear that they will face retaliatory violence upon release. A recent study by the Kukah Centre and Conciliation Resources found that in places where people associated with Boko Haram had been returned, members of the community were not informed in advance, a failing that has fuelled misconceptions and resistance that threaten the long-term viability of reintegration efforts. For example, women and girls who were abducted or lived under Boko Haram strongholds often face suspicion and distrust upon their return. Many people view them as a direct threat, fearing that they have been radicalised and could recruit others. Men associated with Boko Haram experience even greater hostility, as they often are assumed to have been voluntary and active combatants.

Of course, the views among local communities are not uniform. Many recognise the long-term need for reintegration, but feel that it is too soon for former fighters to return. They demand a longer rehabilitation process, and greater support for the affected communities as a whole. Others find it hard to envision living side-by-side with those who killed their relatives or destroyed their village, particularly as long as the needs of victims are left unmet. As one community worker said in Maiduguri, “If somebody shot your father and ran away, how can you accept them back?”.

In response, several international and local civil society groups have been pressing for community participation in reintegration and reconciliation issues. Community-based rehabilitation models can take different forms. Some simply combine support to former combatants and those associated with armed groups, with parallel assistance for affected population groups, such as youths with similar socioeconomic profiles, IDPs, and other vulnerable groups. Others go further and integrate forums for community decision making, to ensure that the DDR process fosters understanding and is embedded in traditional conflict resolution mechanisms.

Underlying these efforts is the assumption that former combatants and returnees must be socially accepted, in order to prevent them from returning to violence. A locally owned reconciliation process may also help overcome the multiple cleavages that have emerged during the war, not only between Boko Haram fighters and civilians, but also between different religious and ethnic groups, IDPs and host communities, citizens and security forces, and those who fled Boko Haram and those who stayed behind. (To be continued).

Serious and Trivial

There are two sides to every coin. Life itself contains not only the good, but also the bad and the ugly. Let us now explore these.

“When passionate employees become quiet, it usually sends a signal that the work environment has become very dysfunctional” – Anonymous.