"I
get the feeling that people in Lagos have been reacting to the violence in
Northern Nigeria like we Londoners used to react to news from Northern Ireland
during the Troubles of the 1970s and 1980s", a friend said.
"They recognise that it's
terribly sad, but it all feels so far away for many of them, not something that
touches their day to day lives," she said. I knew what she meant. I
was in Lagos in April last year, when violence erupted in the North after the
presidential elections. Many hundreds of people died. My Lagosian friends were
concerned and saddened, naturally, but I also felt they were somewhat detached.
They didn’t see events in the North as a direct threat to their own livelihood
or safety. Their own city was doing well economically. I had the sense then
that Nigeria was a country diverging, with a relatively prosperous South
impatient for more progress, and a North still mired in deep poverty.
Nigeria's financial capital. I
sensed that the worsening situation in the North was starting to have an
impact. Expatriate friends, adventurous types who had always loved to explore
Nigeria, told me they felt that much of the North was now out of bounds for
them. And judging from the many messages of dismay I received from Lagos and
the capital Abuja, in the wake of the latest atrocities in Nigeria's second
largest city Kano, most Nigerians recognise that their country is now in grave
danger.
Wherever you are in Nigeria, it is
no longer possible to feel detached from events in the North. Evidently the
people behind this violence are doing their utmost to fuel regional and
religious tensions. There is no more room for complacency because Nigeria is a
notoriously combustible place. Even if much of the talk of it being "on
the brink" or "close to civil war" is lazy and simplistic, what
we are already seeing is bad enough and there is the threat of much worse to
come.
I went to a discussion about the
Nigerian crisis at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. A
well-informed Nigerian said she felt that social media was exacerbating ethnic
and religious divisions. She described outpourings of hatred and prejudice on
sites Facebook and Twitter, leading her to fear the country really is in danger
of falling apart.
I'm not so sure. In part, I think
she may be exaggerating the impact of new media in, say, rural Northern
Nigeria, where the vast majority still rely on the radio for news. But there's
another reason I feel she may be overestimating the harmful impact of social
media.
All over the world, all sorts of
people hide behind the relative anonymity of the internet to say the most
dreadful things. Republicans and Democrats, Greeks and Turks, Arsenal and Spurs
fans, you name it, they can spew bile and poison. It doesn't mean they are
actually going to go out and kill each other.
Social media is a double-edged
sword. It can spread prejudice, but as we saw during the recent fuel protests,
it can also empower people, make them think more about issues, and demand
greater accountability from their leaders. All of which is good for Nigeria.
Perhaps it has helped encourage the many decent people in the north and south
of the country who have come out to protect respective minorities whilst they
pray in churches and mosques.
There's an urgent need for
Nigerians, and outsiders, to understand what drives Boko Haram, if it is to be
defeated.
It's easy to characterise it as part
of a "global jihadist threat", with connections to similar Islamic
extremist groups elsewhere. This analysis seems overly simplified, (although it
is perhaps convenient to those with an interest in bloated security contracts).
Yes, the attack on the UN building in Abuja fitted this pattern, but the rest
of Boko Haram's activities are taking place firmly in the context of Nigeria's
troubled internal dynamics.
These are two of the more nuanced
articles I've read about Boko Haram recently. The first is from the African
Arguments series published here in London; Boko Haram: The Answer to Terror Lies In Providing More Meaningful Human
Security, whilst the other appeared as an op-ed in
the New York Times newspaper; In Nigeria, Boko Haram Is Not the Problem.
In Lagos, and other cities in the
South, it's possible to imagine that Nigeria is going to be the next Brazil, an
emerging giant. In the North, blighted by environmental degradation, struggling
agriculture and collapsed industry, life is no better than in neighbouring
Chad, Niger or Mali.
As long as that gulf exists, Boko
Haram, and groups like it, will not struggle to find recruits for their vile
acts.
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