For years, Nigeria’s political leaders have claimed victory against the insurgent group Boko Haram. However, these claims have often been premature. Attacks and casualties have recently risen. It is in this context that the new service chiefs resume duties.
Less than a year ago, Boko Haram fighters in a deadly attack killed at least 50 Nigerian soldiers in an ambush near Goneri village northern Yobe, according to military officials and villagers.
Last month, the Boko Haram fighter group killed five Nigerian soldiers and kidnapped at least 35 people in Nigeria’s northeastern Borno State, a military source said. The attack occurred just days after over 300 schoolboys were rescued by military forces after being kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists in Katsina State.
Kidnapping of schoolchildren is not new, notably, the 2014 kidnapping of 270 Chibok schoolgirls and the 2018 abduction of 110 girls in the northeast by Boko Haram.
Loss of territory to internal insurgency features among the indices of a failing state. This is because the security of lives and property is not just a statutorily imposed duty of government; it is the primary and most fundamental duty of any government. Any government that cannot perform that duty does not deserve to remain in power.
In fact, all the classical social contract theorists – Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau would argue that the government, by not ensuring the protection of lives and property (the original reason for the existence of government), has lost its right to exist.
The concept of social contract theory is that in the beginning man lived in the state of nature. They had no government and there was no law to regulate them. There were hardships and oppression on the sections of the society. To overcome these hardships they entered into two agreements which are: Pactum Unionis; and Pactum Subjectionis.
By the first pact of unionis, people sought the protection of their lives and property. As a result of it, a society was formed where people undertook to respect each other and live in peace and harmony. By the second pact of subjectionis, people united together and pledged to obey an authority and surrendered the whole or part of their freedom and rights to an authority. The authority guaranteed everyone protection of life, property and to certain extent liberty.
It is within this framework of the social contract that we will show the significance of the appointment of these new service chiefs. Will they deliver protection for lives and property to demand that Nigerians surrender part of their rights? One way to examine the competence of the new security service chiefs is by assessing their previous performance. Our focus will be on the chief of army staff because of the critical role the office plays in the fight against insurgency.
Ibrahim Attahiru, a major general, was appointed the chief of army staff and succeeds Tukur Buratai, a lieutenant general. Fifty-four years old Attahiru is a native of Kaduna State.
At a time, he was the Theatre Commander of the Operation Lafiya Dole until he was sacked in 2017 for alleged incompetence. Buratai fired Attahiru from the frontlines in December of 2017 after he failed to meet a July 2017 deadline to deliver Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau dead or alive within 40 days.
Until his recent appointment, he was the General Officer Commanding 82 Division of the Nigerian Army, Enugu.
Under Attahiru’s watch, suicide bombings and attacks on military formations were on the rise. Barely a month after he assumed office, Boko Haram insurgents attacked Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.
More than 30,000 people have been killed and nearly 3 million displaced in a decade of Boko Haram violence in Nigeria, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
According to the UN Refugee Agency, violence by Boko Haram has affected 26 million people in the Lake Chad region and displaced 2.6 million others. The question is how Attahiru would deal with the insurgency in the North-East having reportedly failed to do so three years ago.
Attahiru resumes office at a time when the military faces many proven and unproven allegations of human rights abuses and the law of armed conflict violations. The burden lies on the new chief of army staff to demonstrate competence by pushing back the insurgency in contrast to his 2017 performance.
