The Shael without Idriss Déby

New uncertainties next door in the Greater Sahel

Victor Angelo

 

In 1990, the Chadian rebel leader Idriss Déby returned to the country from Sudan. He led a column of armed men, composed mainly of fighters from his home region.  Days later he seized power in Ndjamena, with the approval of François Mitterrand. The French president knew his geopolitics. He saw Chad as the essential node for the interests, influence and security of France and its client states in that part of Africa. Therefore, it was essential that it be controlled by a strong man, consistent and friendly to France. Déby had this profile. And successive French presidents got used to turning a blind eye to systematic human rights violations, high-scale corruption, and the tribalization of power, so as not to weaken their ally in Ndjamena.

The support became even more solid when Déby decided that his troops would be, on the African side, the strong arm in the fight against the different jihadist groups that terrorize the populations of the Sahel. His military became by far the best prepared in the region. Even against Boko Haram, Chad's capability is far superior to Nigeria's. The UN mission in Mali (MINUSMA) has a considerable Chadian presence - 1400 troops, with a more offensive posture than most other blue helmets. In addition, Déby had just sent an additional 1200-man brigade, as part of the regional military cooperation known as G5 Sahel, to the three-border area especially targeted by terrorists - the triangle where Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso converge.

The military institutions of the countries in the region are structurally weak and kept that way by politicians, who are more afraid of possible coups than of terrorists. Of all the neighbours, only Déby, trained as an officer in France and hardened in the desert campaigns, was a true war chief. His combativeness was legendary. In 2008, a rebel faction arrived at the gates of his palace. Nicolas Sarkozy proposed that he be exfiltrated into a golden exile. Déby and other loyalists, some of them now members of the Transitional Military Council, refused, preferring to fight to the end. And they eventually defeated the assailants. Shortly afterwards, as the UN Special Representative, I discussed this crisis with Déby. I recall three points from that meeting. First, the recognition that his troops were neither organized nor equipped effectively. Second, the decision to spend a good deal of oil money on transforming his fighters into professional soldiers. Third, the decision to seek an understanding with Omar al-Bashir's Sudan, as he had already done with Gaddafi's Libya, so that neighbouring territories would not be used as bases for launching rebellions. And so it was. By late 2009, the difference was already clear. Since then, these capabilities have been consolidated. France, the United States, and other Westerners began to see Chad as the spearhead against terrorism and religious extremism. Criticism of dictatorship and nepotism have been put in the freezer.

But in these lands of instability, life takes many turns. Déby closed his cycle this week, perhaps in a similar way to the one he did thirty years ago. Only this time the rebel column was from the tribe next door, it came from Libya, and the president fell on the front line. Chad, Central Africa, the Sahel, France, and the Europeans present in the region became more fragile.

Several questions arise from the disappearance of Idriss Déby. What motivated President Macron to leave him without his usual support, when in 2019 he had sent fighters to quell a similar rebellion? Miscalculation? Who is behind this new rebellion, known as FACT (Front for Change and Concord in Chad)? What impact will the new reality have on the conflict in the Central African Republic? What to expect from the G5 Sahel and the fight against terrorism in this part of Africa? Each of these questions hides many uncertainties and concerns. The future of the poor people of Chad is the greatest of them.

(Automatic translation of the opinion piece I published today in the Diário de Notícias, the old and prestigious Lisbon newspaper)

 

 

Africa´s security: a collective and national effort

The issues of national and people´s security remain a core problem for several African States. 

Boko Haram is the most visible example of a country´s weak security systems. Nigeria has large military and police forces and services. It has been one the most assiduous participant in UN peacekeeping operations. But when challenged by a domestic group of extremists and fanatics it became obvious that big numbers do not mean effectiveness. 

Nigeria and many other countries will have to reform the armed forces and ensure a better coordination between the military and the police services. The reform includes a greater emphasis on professionalism, discipline, good management of the resources and better links with the citizens.

 Better security is also related to a regional response. The cooperation within the framework of the African Union and the Regional Economic Communities calls for an acceleration of the current efforts and a greater commitment to collective defence. 

Fighting Boko Haram

The Chibok girls were kidnapped by Boko Haram a year ago. And many other Nigerian girls and women have also been taken hostage by this terrorist group. Everyone condemns these actions. But we should go beyond that and ask loud and clear how can that happen in a country that has one of the largest and better African equipped armies. How is it possible that a terrorist group has been able to capture people and territory? And then, we need to raise another question: where did they get the weaponry from?

Chad and Niger have now been engaged in the fight against Boko Haram, side by side with the Nigerian Army. There have been reports of some serious setbacks for the terrorists. But as of late one gets the impression that the anti-Boko Haram coalition is no longer making any tangible headway. Why is it?

The missing people and the memory of all those who have been executed by the savages under the banner of Boko Haram call for an answer to all the questions. They also call for clarity about the situation. 

Boko Haram requires a powerful and urgent response

At the very beginning of the year my magazine´s editor-in-chief at Visão asked me to write about Africa in 2015. I did. And I spent most of the allocated space focusing on Nigeria, as the country to watch this year. Within Nigeria, the key issue I mentioned was of course Boko Haram. I also said that Boko Haram would be spreading out towards the neighbouring countries. And that´s very much the case today. This terrorist group is not only a major threat to the stability of Nigeria, It is also a serious menace for Niger, Cameron and Chad. As such, it calls for a major international alliance to deal with it. The sooner the international community addresses this very serious problem the better. Nigeria can´t do it. And Chad alone, notwithstanding the strength of its armed forces, is not enough. 

AQMI and Boko Haram should be wiped out soonest

Besides other places, there is concern in Burkina Faso and Niger that Boko Haram and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, also known as AQMI, are trying to establish a logistics and safety corridor between them. The authorities in these countries think the threat is serious enough. It should not either be ignored or treated lightly.

I am not sure about the link between the two organizations. But I for sure think that fighting both of them is a matter of great urgency. They call for decisive action. They should be smashed. We have been too slow in responding to these terrorist groups. And when we hesitate they take it as a licence to expand and bring instability and death to new areas of influence.

Again, I think we have to mobilize a coalition of states, including some from outside the region, to fight these crazy and dangerous fellows. I would like to see more voices repeating this message. 

Chadian army ordered to fight Boko Haram

The good news is that the Chadian army has now been ordered to move into the Boko Haram area and fight the terrorists. The Chadians are by far the best army in the region. They certainly can achieve some results.

Now the point is to see if the Nigerian government is prepared to accept such deployment within its territory. I hope they will. And it should be possible because there is already a cooperation framework between Chad, Nigeria and Niger with the aim to fight terrorism around the Lake. But this is a time for elections in Nigeria and some politicians might think that the Chadian intervention might signal to the voters that the national authorities cannot do what the Chadians can. Let´s hope that will not be the official position in Abuja. 

Fighting Boko Haram is a priority

We should not lose sight of Boko Haram. They are a major threat to the populations of the region and to stability in Nigeria and the Lake Chad part of Africa. The government of Nigeria has no capacity to respond to the menace. We should be very clear about it. And engage the authorities in Abuja with an offer of international security assistance that makes sense and cannot be ignored. This has now become a matter of great urgency. Concerted multilateral action and the appropriate pressure on the national authorities of Nigeria should be made as soon as possible, even before the presidential elections of this coming February. Then, just after the elections – which by the way will be pretty messy –deployments should take place. The poor populations of remote North-eastern Nigeria need all help they can get. And this is not neo-colonialism. It´s solidarity and also the recognition that further destabilisation of Central Africa and the Sahel will have a negative impact well beyond the region. 

Nigeria is being destroyed as a result of many years of corrupted practices

A large number of school children were killed today in North-east Nigeria by a suicide bomber. It was another tragedy in a country that is a key target for extremists.

I feel very sorry for the people of Nigeria. But not just because of the mass killings. Also because the widespread insecurity is the tip of a huge iceberg, made of large-scale corruption. Plenty of money has been spent on the armed forces and the police and these institutions are as weak as the rest of the public services. A good chunk of the resources was wasted and misappropriated.

 Institutions have just become facades, nothing else. That´s why Nigeria, which has a very big military establishment, cannot deal with Boko Haram. If one takes into account that Boko Haram and the extremists are just a bunch of unsophisticated terrorists one realises better the measure of the inefficiency that has resulted from many years of corrupted practices at very high levels of authority. 

Nigeria: can we believe there is an agreement with Boko Haram?

Knowing as I know the players, I am afraid the announcement made by the Nigerian presidency regarding an accord with Boko Haram might just be wishful thinking, at best. But it can even be worse than that. It can just be a deceitful statement at a time the electoral fever is about to start.

The next few days will tell. 

Little minds

There are so many new headlines from Gaza to Ukraine, from the planes that crash here and there, and then the Summer recess, that we just forget that the Nigerian school girls have not yet been freed, after several months in the hands of Boko Haram, and the Central African Republic is still the murderous chaos it was a few weeks back. And that the elections in Afghanistan are yet to be sorted out, long after the polling day. Not to mention Iraq, Libya, South Sudan, and so on...

Our attention lost sight of the Boko Haram girls

Boko Haram is still very much alive and kicking. They keep attacking civilians in Northeast Nigeria and making sure everybody understands that the federal government is just composed of a bunch of inept political opportunists. The school girls are yet to be freed. And the international security teams that came to help are now realising that corruption within the armed forces of Nigeria is a major handicap. A few generals have now been accused of selling weapons to the armed extremists. But that´s not enough to turn things around. And the world has lost sight of the girls and the extremism and moved its attention elsewhere. 

Boko Haram in Paris

Today´s summit on Boko Haram, convened at the Elysée Palace by President François Hollande, should be seen as a constructive initiative. 

The concrete results in terms of fighting the Nigerian terrorist group might be very tiny. But it had some other advantages.

 It kept the pressure on the President of Nigeria. President Goodluck Jonathan must take the issue with a greater degree of seriousness. 

It also showed that the countries in the region – particularly Cameroon and Chad – must be fully engaged and cooperate among themselves. This is lacking. Especially as it concerns Cameroon. North Cameroon – an area I know relatively well – is a forgotten region, when seen from the capital Yaoundé. This has to change. The Cameroonians have to increase their police and armed forces presence in the North. They have also to be prepared to cooperate with Nigeria and Chad. 

The summit has also emphasized that the problem requires international cooperation if it is to be tackled without further delay. France can certainly play a role on the French-speaking side of the region. The UK has to be more involved on the Nigerian side. And French and British intelligence services have to work hand in hand on the ground and be willing to treat the African counterparts as equals.

All this is a bit of an ambition. Not easy to achieve. But it has to be said. And the pressure has to go on.

We will see what progress will be reported as accomplished when the ministers meet for a follow-up conference next month in the UK. 

#BringBackOurGirls

The international campaign #BringBackOurGirls has had some impact on the Nigerian government. The President is finally moving. For about three weeks – and this bog has been one of the very first to call the attention to the terrible fate the school girls kidnapped by the Boko Haram terrorists were in – the country´s leadership tried to sweep the issue under the carpet. Now the outcry is too big to be ignored.

But a key question remains: how to explain the failure to protect these school children and the many civilians in the North-Eastern part of the country that are under constant threat? How can we understand this failure in a country that has a large army, good special forces and good intelligence? Who is giving a chance to Boko Haram to commit the horrendous crimes that are now their trademark? Who are the political backers of the terrorists and why? 

Boko Haram

At the beginning of the week, the terrorist group Boko Haram attacked a boarding school in Northern Nigeria and kidnapped over 130 student girls. They came with trucks and other vehicles and could move around and leave with the victims, all of this in a State that is supposed to be heavy patrolled by the Nigerian Army. Since then, notwithstanding the fact that the Army launched a major operation, the terrorists and the girls have not been found. This is again raising a number of very fundamental questions about the capacity of the national authorities to address the challenges Boko Haram poses. Something is very wrong in the way the Nigerian leaders are responding to Boko Haram.

The neighbouring countries, particularly Chad, and the friends of Nigeria are getting very worried. The terrorists are just becoming too big a menace. 

Ransom payments

A few years ago, when I was based in N’Djamena, I visited the Waza National Park, in Northern Cameroon on three different occasions.

The Park is located in a desolated corner of Central Africa. The main road between N’Djamena and Waza is a very strange place. You feel desperately isolated over there. It is a Cameroonian road that has seen better days. If you stop your car and walk to the right hand shoulder of the road you are in Nigerian territory. If go off road to the left you soon hit the Chadian border. On both sides you meet from time to time a few villages where life is tough and as arid as the land. And at certain times of the year, you come across the nomad people known as Mbororo, a subgroup of cattle-herders linked to the Fulani ethnic group. Actually, it is much easier to see their cows in the Waza National Park than wild animals.  

It is not a place for mass tourism.

This was the place however where a French family was kidnapped a couple of months ago. The parents and their children, plus another male relative, had been on a visit to the park. They were then taken by force across the border into Nigeria. At the time the media said they had been hijacked by the terrorist group Boko Haram. Maybe, maybe not, as there are other armed bandits in the region.

The fact of the matter is that the family was released without a fight and in very unclear circumstances a couple of days ago. The French government, including the President himself, were very much at the forefront of this liberation and made sure the media coverage was as good as it gets. And they were quick to deny that ransom money had been paid.

I want to believe so. I also know that up to very recently the French authorities used to pay – and deny it – for the French nationals that had been kidnapped in Africa to be set free. That was a very wrong approach to the problem. That was the best way to encourage the bandits expand the business and to look for more victims.

But is it a better approach to put a lot of political pressure on the governments of Cameroon and Nigeria for them to make a nice gesture and open the prison gates to a good number of incarcerated people who happen to be connected to the kidnappers? 

Let the Nigerians do the job

The Islamist group called "Vanguards for the Protection of Muslims in Black Africa", also known as Ansaru, is a terrorist organisation aligned with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). It operates in the Northern part of Nigeria, as a dissident fraction of the better known network of terrorists Boko Haram. They have specialised in the kidnapping of Western nationals working in the country.

Yesterday they executed seven hostages that they had taken recently. The circumstances of these killings remain unclear. But I suspect that the Ansaru men might have felt threatened by an impending military operation against them, most likely involving some form of cooperation between the armed forces of Nigeria and a Western secret service.  If that was the case it would mean that someone in the know might have warned the terrorists. A Western “muscled presence” in those corners of the country is very conspicuous.

Lessons need to be drawn then. Northern Nigeria is not a safe place, neither for white civilians nor for Western services. When it comes to hostages, the job should be done by the Nigerian Special Forces and intelligence officers. They can go far and wide, if the political green light comes from Abuja.