Memo to Buhari over Terrorists’ Attack on Gubio, Magumeri and Others

Memo

Memo to Buhari over Terrorists’ Attack on Gubio,
Magumeri and Others
By Zanna Hassan Boguma

For the Attention of General Babagana Monguno NSA

Dearest President,

I hope my letter reaches you in good health. My special regards
to you and members of the esteemed first family and best wishes and
a lot of appreciations for your fatherly attention to us people of
Borno and the Northeast.

I wrote you this letter in response to the numerous social media
comments on the last military statement denying the dare devil and
daring attacks on Gubio and Magumeri local governments of Borno
state. The attempts by BH to intimidate and attack communities in
the state and the actions of our soldiers in the frontline has made
us loose confidence in the recent military’s performance in
protecting not only the vulnerable citizens but even the
territorial boundaries of the nation.

Your Excellency, while lauding the efforts of the N /Army for
their gallantry in other part of the state, much is needed to be
done in areas around MMC and Jere and in recent attacks on Nganzai,
Gajiganna, Gubio, Magumeri, Amurwa, Kalali Abdul, Wanori and
yesterday, Dalori villages. The incessant and daring attacks by BHT
is becoming a source of great concern to citizens living in the two
local govts and five villages simultaneously attacked for three
days without any counter measures or even a response to distress
calls from the locals.

A country’s armed forces were suppose to be a proud and
patriotic defenders of both the nation’s territories and it’s
citizens, but our today’s men of the armed forces were either
overwhelmed by the desire to amass wealth by all means and, on the
bloods of the innocent Nigerian citizens, or have been compromised
by theories of conspiracy and collaboration by deserting their
formations in the face of attacks by the insurgents.

We’ve been hearing of successes recorded by battalions outside
Maiduguri in their clearance operations while the BHT that were
hibernating around the Alau general area and in the recent local
governments of Gubio and Magumeri were allowed to have a field day
without any rapid response from the military except for them to
take to their heels leaving all hardwares to be carted away by the
insurgents.

In most cases, they were not pursued rather, they dare to attack
and always allowed to go which smack only a mockery of our
security. The Nigeria armed forces were rated to be the finest in
Africa, but the present crop of the soldiers sent to the frontline
were either not ready to fight or were compromised. One silly rumor
in town was the stories of our men divided along parochial lines of
tribe and religion which will not augur well for national
security.

Your Excellency, may kindly wish to recall your exploits as an
army commander. We living in Borno will never forget your
patriotism and sense of duty by commandeering the reclaiming of our
territories from Chad in the 80s against all odds. But from the
happenings in Borno and elsewhere, the field commanders and their
men in most cases have turned the theatre of war into a milking
cow. Many have abdicated their responsibility as defenders of the
citizens without confronting the terrorists.

I believe as done in all places, all new entrants in the armed
forces were sworn to uphold the constitution and to protect the
territorial integrity of the country, an oath of allegiance and
promise to lay their arms in protecting both the civilians and the
nation against any enemy domestic and foreign; however, in the
Nigeria of today and as seen in the recent action of our men on the
frontline, these principles were compromised.

Your Excellency, is not being told the truth about the situation
on the theatre of war. You are either fed with false information,
or raising hopes of technical defeat of the BH which is far from
the truth. Agreed our armed forces were overstretched. Agreed their
equipments were obsolete and their conditions were really not
promising, but as a nation, they were trained to confront the worst
of enemies than the rag tag, untrained in skills and professionally
bankrupt miscreants who capitalize on their fear and weakness to
daily wreck havoc on them and vulnerable citizens.

The recent systematic attacks on Gubio a strategic battalion and
forcing them to withdraw is not only a shame but a slap on the face
of our armed forces and a smack of mockery and abuse on the
strength and professionalism of our armed forces which was once a
formidable force in the Africa.

Patriotism being the hallmark of all military operations is near
absent, in most cases men that were lacking in experiences of war
tactics were posted a seeming guerrilla like operations. The
special forces that would have dealt with the peculiarities of
insurgency were not properly involved in the operation and
munitions that could have been used were not on ground to confront
the monster head on.

Your Excellency, one very potent war strategy is propaganda
which has been effectively used by the enemies to send fears into
the spine of our young and in experienced soldiers. This strategy
would have been used by our officers to intimidate the enemy.

Instead of taking the offensive to the enemies, our men were
confined to trenches waiting to be attacked. The continued reports
of repels and foiling of attacks were never a war strategy that is
intended to end. Sometimes those officers that have the zeal and
passion for the profession were demoralized by their commanders and
in most cases prevented from either pursuing the enemies or even in
responding to intelligence information about the movements of the
insurgents.

In counter insurgency operations, you don’t wait to be attacked
rather you take the war to the enclaves and hide outs of the
insurgents. In Syria and Iraq, the military used the strategy of
offensive warfare to both technically defeat and degraded the ISIS
insurgency in their country. Not only that, the militia were
effectively used to achieve success in the operation to capture
their territories and send the insurgents running.

Also, one of the disheartening and most demeaning aspect of the
war is that, the Chadian, Cameroonian and Nigerien armed force seem
to be more professional and determined in the operation. Their
courageous pursuit of the enemies in the Lake Chad has exposed our
soldiers as cowards and unserious which has reduced their image of
once the most fearsome and professional army.

Cases of desertion and abandonment of formations need to be
thoroughly investigated. Cordon and search operations must be
seriously intensified and punitive expeditions intensified. No
matter the consequences, the infantry must come into the operation
and with full air support if we truly want to end this challenge.
The hunters who were the masters of the forest, the determined CJTF
and our vigilantes should be brought into the fight if we really
want to achieve success in the war. These if effectively
implemented will greatly assist in countering the insurgency.

There are many questions to be asked in the face of the recent
actions of the military in the operation. There is a seeming case
of sabotage, collaboration and negligence seen in most of the
recent attacks.

Former President Jonathan was accused of conspiracy and
complacency. The then military was accused of sabotage and sellout,
they were accused of using the insurgency to enrich themselves and
from the look of things, history seems to be repeating itself if
not the worst, similar to the one that had happened.

We in Borno and the North have high hopes when we elected this
government, we saw in you hope of redemption from our national
calamities knowing very well your patriotism and integrity. In the
last four years, these hopes were translated into reality but with
the recent upsurge in insurgent’s activity in Northern Borno and
the actions of the military, we were left with no options than to
despair.

Unfortunately for us, and with all sense of regrets and
apologies, our sons who were suppose to feel our pains seem not
helping. We had all it take to bemoan their silent and ineffective
response to the plight of their state, region and people. The
Chiefs of Army and Air force were both from the Northeast, the
National Security Adviser, the Chief of Staff to the President and
the SGF all were from the region yet, they remained mute and
inactive.

As our leader and President, we in Borno and the Northeast will
always remain indebted to you for identifying with us, for the
concerns you have for our region and for the lofty intentions you
have of transforming our region to greater heights. Your political
will to end the insurgency, the drilling of oil in the Lake Chad,
the recharging of the Lake Chad and many more which the insurgency
has made it impossible is fresh in our memories. In terms of
representation in government, you gave us all that it takes to make
our region great. But, those entrusted have not only failed us, but
have failed you in actualizing your objective of building a secured
and prosperous nation.

I wish the authorities concerned will shelve all their personal
or parochial interests and put the safety of the citizens and the
nation first and re-strategize their operational methods in
defeating the enemies of the nation. His Eminence the Shehu of
Borno had told you about the current realities when you visited him
in his palace. His Eminence has spoken the minds of all the people
of Borno and by extension the Northeast when he told Mr. President,
that the insurgents have virtually surrounded Borno not far away
from the state capital to which nothing has been done until these
realities were today being seen around us. His Excellency, our
Governor too has severally seen you on the matter. Now is the time
for Mr. President to personally interface with our community
leaders to debrief him on vital intelligence and in real situations
in Borno and the Northeast.

As did before, Mr. President should direct the Service Chiefs to
relocate to Borno to finally operationalize the defeat of BH as was
done in Syria and Iraq. The military should take the offensive
position to deal with the problem. They don’t just wait for the
enemy to strike. They should never allow the enemy to understand
their fears and weaknesses”.

As I am writing this open letter to you, all military formations
were withdrawn from all their strategic locations and this action
has made our remaining communities more vulnerable to attacks by
BH. This action has also emboldened confidence of the BH to daily
attack and ransack communities that were unprotected due to the
lack of military presence. Residents of Gubio and Magumeri local
governments have also deserted the two strategic towns thus opening
for the BH a clear course to descend on Maiduguri. Routes from
Maiduguri to Damasak, Maiduguri to Monguno and Maiduguri to Konduga
and Bama were all made vulnerable with this withdrawal.

This letter does not intend to put our men of the armed force to
disrepute, nor the institution as incapable, rather, we felt as
citizens to plead for more viable approach to the fight against the
insurgency and put to an end the lingering insecurity bedeviling
our nation. As a patriotic and professional institution in which
Mr. President has once served, the military is seen as our hope for
peace and stability in the country and Mr. President as the
Commander in Chief, need to know that we are concerned and worried.
Let our despair be turned into optimism and let us be patriotic to
our nation and protect our country’s image and integrity.

Mr. President may kindly accept the assurances of our highest
regards and love while praying to the Almighty to protect you
against all and a special prayer for our men of the armed force for
victory and protection.

Yours,
Zanna Hassan Boguma
(Zanna Boguma of Borno)