Nigerians received good news this week with the release of approximately 101 girls who were kidnapped by Boko Haram on 19 February this year, taken from a government-run boarding school in Dapchi, Yobe State.

President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration seemed determined to avoid the predicament his predecessor faced in 2014, when Boko Haram kidnapped 276 girls from a school in Chibok just months ahead of a presidential elections. That incident triggered one of the largest social media storms in history, making #BringBackOurGirls one of the biggest hashtags ever on Twitter. Within two weeks #BringBackOurGirls had been tweeted over two million times. So when the “Dapchi girls” were taken, there was a sense of déjà vu as well as palpable political panic for Buhari’s party as it heads into presidential election, slated for early 2019.

This post draws upon research I conducted for my new book, Nigerian Party Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror, forthcoming later in 2018 from Cambridge University Press. My content analysis of political rhetoric used by officials from the People’s Democratic Party and the (then) opposition All Progressives Congress shows that insecurity did not top the list of campaign themes in the 2015 presidential election. Consistent with some existing research on terrorism in democracies (see for example Marcus, Neuman and MacKuen 2000), voters had a heightened sense of general political awareness and engagement. Nigerians ultimately cast their lot with the party that offered a persuasive portfolio of issues that included the economy, corruption, and what I categorize as “electoral integrity.” In effect, #BringBackOurGirls mattered – not just for how citizens thought about insecurity but for how they evaluated several types of policy performance.

How President Jonathan’s Administration Mishandled Chibok

In the months that followed the Chibok kidnappings, a series of communications blunders by President Jonathan damaged his administration’s credibility. First, the military said they had rescued the Chibok girls in April 2014, infuriating the girls’ parents (See Ameh, John, Jude Owuamanam, and Kayode Idowu. 2014. “Military Lied about Schoolchildren Rescue – Principal, Parents.” Punch, April 18). The military also provided different numbers of those kidnapped, contributing to confusion and conspiracy theories about how the administration might benefit from the kidnapping.

A #BringBackOurGirls vigil at the White House in January 2017 for the Chibok girls. Kidnapped in 2014, approximately 100 of them remain prisoners of Boko Haram in northeastern Nigeria. It was a very cold day (I’m on the right).

The second communications blunder unfolded a month later when the Chief of Defence Staff said that the government knew where the girls were. This was untrue, and briefly intensified public frustration and demands for a rescue operation or additional military action (See Jones, Barbara. 2014. “Hostage Schoolgirl Exclusive.” Daily Mail, May 31). General Chris Olukolade made a similar stumble later that year in September, when he declared that some of the girls were safe in a military barracks – but then retracted that statement (See “Army Backtracks on Schoolgirls’ Release.” 2014. BBC, September 23). As international attention hit its peak, President Jonathan was filmed dancing at a wedding celebrating, creating the impression of detachment or apathy.

Third, as the #BringBackOurGirls movement held peaceful vigils around Abuja, the police commissioner for the Federal Capital Territory banned the gatherings. “I cannot fold my hands and watch this lawlessness,” he declared. The immediate embarrassment and scandal prompted a swift retraction by police leadership (Nnochiri, Ikechukwu, Emmanuel Elebeke, and Abdulwahab Abdulah. 2014. “Chibok Girls – We Didn’t Ban Rallies in Abuja – IG.” Vanguard, June 4).

Fourth, some military officials told newspapers that ten generals and other military officers had been convicted by court-martial for providing arms to Boko Haram. (What happened in these cases remains unclear to me.) A Ministry of Defence spokesperson immediately disputed those reports, according to the Associated Press.

A fifth public relations blunder unfolded in July, when President Jonathan refused to meet with some parents who wanted to be accompanied by #BringBackOurGirls leaders, who had paid the parents’ way from Chibok for the meeting.

Finally, the Jonathan administration repeatedly sent mixed messages about its willingness to negotiate with Boko Haram or whether it had agreed upon a ceasefire. On a few occasions, intermediaries reported that Boko Haram was willing to trade hostages for prisoners. According to a member of the Northern Elders Forum whom I interviewed for my book, Jonathan and the PDP “wanted to keep the turmoil going because it had political value for them.”

Is Dapchi Chibok Redux?

In the final year of President Jonathan’s tenure, the decline of security in the northeast and his administration’s mishandling of the Chibok girls weakened the PDP’s case for successful counter-terrorism. This “credibility gap” just before the 2015 elections increased voter skepticism about the incumbent party’s ability to run fair elections, and most importantly, according to the evidence I present in Nigerian Party Competition, to deliver on the economy.

There are a few similarities today with Buhari’s predicament. Shortly before the release of the Dapchi victims, for example, Bring Back Our Girls complained about “the troubling sparseness of information” from the federal government about the Yobe State girls.

Several Dapchi children remain unaccounted for, and the government’s communications strategy remains uncoordinated. Notably, the number of those released has fluctuated with the government first mentioning 76 girls, and quickly revising this upwards to 101.

Worse, the Nigerian military may have failed to act on information that Boko Haram was moving toward Dapchi, resembling comments from government sources who told me that Boko Haram ran amok in Chibok for several hours before the Army arrived. “The authorities appear to have learned nothing from the abduction of 276 schoolgirls in Chibok,” said Amnesty International’s investigators of the Dapchi incident.

Buhari has on several occasions claimed that Boko Haram was defeated, so the Dapchi kidnapping widened the credibility gap with the public. As in 2015, citizens might treat campaign claims about economic growth or other issues with the same skepticism they now view the Buhari administration’s progress against Boko Haram. And if the administration paid the group money in return for the girls’ release, it is only a matter of time until the extortionists strike again.

In my new book, I explain how Nigeria’s ruling People’s Democratic Party lost to a new opposition party, the All Progressives Congress, in 2015. This is the first of several blog posts previewing findings in my forthcoming Nigerian Party Competition in a Time of Transition and Terror (Cambridge University Press) and linking the research to the upcoming 2019 presidential elections.

In Chapter 3, “Voting Against Violence? Insecurity and Economic Uncertainty in the Presidential Election,” I conduct a content analysis of the campaign rhetoric of Muhammadu Buhari (APC) and Goodluck Jonathan (PDP) as well as two top officials from each party. One unexpected result, which I highlighted at a very informative panel today organized by the International Republican Institute, is that out of five categories of issues discussed by the candidates, gender and social issues received the fewest mentions. Only 7.4% of the 929 coded references discussed gender, which I grouped with other “social issues” including health and education.

Panel on women in Nigeria’s 2019 elections. L-R: Jackson M’vuganyi, Ayisha Osori, me, and Sentell Barnes of IRI.

Even more importantly though, the parties clearly campaigned on different issues. The APC mentioned social issues twice as often as the PDP. Was this a mistake by the Jonathan campaign? While issues such as insecurity and the economy were perhaps a more difficult sell for President Jonathan (in light of an increase in Boko Haram’s violence in late 2014 and a decline in oil prices), his administration had made some important gains on gender. For example:

• The UNDP report assessing progress towards the Millennium Development Goals for 2015 noted declines in infant mortality and increases in immunization rates. Maternal mortality declined and the access to skilled birth attendants (such as midwives) increased.
• The gender disparity in education at the primary and secondary level virtually disappeared (at least in aggregate national terms), prompting the UNDP to conclude that Nigeria achieved the MDC target by enrolling one female for every male.
• According to the National Bureau of Statistics, 2014 also reported a slight increase in women’s literacy and in secondary school attendance rate.
• Access to higher education in the north increased with the construction of federal universities in nine states that did not have one. “For you to liberate any group of human beings, whether they are from the Southern creeks or from the North, it is education,” Jonathan said in 2013.
• In terms of political empowerment, some academic studies similarly concluded that women made important strides under Jonathan, crediting affirmative action and inclusion of gender in Federal Character (Gberevbie and Oviasogie 2013).

Yet the PDP just did not make women’s issues a campaign priority. I suggest in my book that this was a mistake.

This data is based on a content analysis of 929 coded comments by the top three officials in each political campaign, based on a sample of 2,390 articles from This Day, Daily Trust, and Vanguard. PDP officials: Goodluck Jonathan; Doyin Okupe, the Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs to President; and Adamu Mua’zu, former PDP National Working Committee Chairman.  APC officials: Muhammadu Buhari; Lai Mohammed, National Publicity Secretary; and Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, Director-General of the Presidential Campaign.

How might gender be relevant in the 2019 presidential election?

This question was the focus of a panel discussion today at IRI. Looking beyond the 2015 elections, I presented evidence that women have gone backwards under the Buhari administration. As promised during the campaign, Buhari abolished the Office of the First Lady in August 2015. “All that ostentation, ubiquitousness and arrogance we have come to expect from the office are over and done with,” said a statement from Aso Rock. Buhari also infamously scolded his wife for expressing her political views, saying “I don’t know which party my wife belongs to, but she belongs to my kitchen and my living room and the other room.”

The rhetoric has unfortunately correlated pretty well with other indicators of women’s status under the Buhari administration. According to the Global Gender Gap Reports for 2015 and 2017, there has been a slight decline in the percent of women enrolled in tertiary education, and a steep decline in the number of women ministers – from 24 to 12. It appears that women’s income has actually gone up under Buhari, but it has done so at the expense of men. A decline in the purchasing power parity of men, in this context, is a scary recipe for a backlash against women. These figures should not be taken as the consequence of any specific government policy. But such data do often point to a deeper social sentiment, much like racial and class animosity that played out in America’s 2016 election.

Buhari and the APC still have a chance to turn things around. They could start by recruiting more women to run as APC candidates, as Aisha Osori, author of Love Does not Win Elections is urging. The APC could also coordinate an effort to get states to pass implementing legislation for the Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAPP) Act 2015, which provides a protective legal framework for women and girls. With the possibility of a backlash against women, this seems especially important.

At the moment though, the picture looks bleak. Buhari is repeating some of the mistakes made by President Jonathan with the 2014 #BringBackOurGirls movement as his administration grapples with the schoolgirls recently kidnapped from Yobe State.  My next post will detail those public relations blunders.

Brewing Local Complaints about Chinese Construction

But in the Rift Valley, ordinary people increasingly see the government’s vision for modernization as problematic. According to local activists I visited, the project has proceeded with little consultation from impacted communities. The CCCC often hires workers for a probationary period with the promise of a permanent position that never transpires because they are fired before the period ends. Workers take the jobs at $5 a day, and have had no success seeking a modest wage increase to $7. The Chinese have resisted calls for unionization, and they manage to use Chinese workers for certain tasks despite Kenyan requirements to employ locals.

Environmental Impacts

A wild giraffe wandering the Ngong Hills. Due to local conservation efforts by the Maasai, giraffe populations have recovered over the last decade.

• Fair pay
• Improved environmental safety
• Jobs for locals first, not foreigners
• Increased employment opportunities for women
• Community social responsibility
• “health and safety for all”

Should the United States sell attack aircraft to Nigeria? The following letter, signed by an unusual cross-section of advocacy organizations, was sent to the chairs and ranking members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Dear Chairman Corker, Senator Cardin, Chairman Royce and Representative Engel,

We the undersigned organizations are writing to convey our concerns regarding reports that the Trump administration is moving forward with plans to sell A-29 Super Tucano light attack aircraft, with mounted machine guns and related part and logistical support to the government of Nigeria. We believe that without concrete evidence that the Nigerian government is taking action to protect human rights and enforce accountability, this transfer is a mistake.

In June of 2016 we expressed concerns over the same proposed sale to President Obama, citing the lack of adequate safeguards and accountability mechanisms to ensure that the Tucano aircraft would be used consistently with international human rights and humanitarian law by the Nigerian military.  We reiterate those concerns now and ask that you take steps to limit the risks that equipment supplied by the US will be used to commit violations of human rights and humanitarian law.

Our message to the Obama administration was that the US should insist on securing robust, end use monitoring commitments, safeguards against further human rights violations, and other credible and measurable progress on accountability within the Nigerian security forces.  These recommendations were offered with the aim of ensuring that the United States did not inadvertently facilitate the commission of human rights abuses in Nigeria and to try and help turn the page on the culture impunity within the Nigerian military before making a final decision to move forward with the sale.

Super Tucano aircraft (photo: DOD)

In the letter we sent to the Obama administration on June 1, 2016 we listed several incidents of human rights violations that indicated a systemic failure to respect human rights and enforce accountability within the Nigerian security forces (see attached).  Unfortunately, to date there has been no progress towards investigating any of those past incidents or bringing persons responsible for those abuses to justice.   Indeed, in 2017 new concerns have arisen with the January 2017 bombing of a remote displaced persons camp in Rann, close to the border with Cameroon.   That action by the Nigerian Air Force killed at least 126 people (and possibly as many as 200), and it demonstrates the urgency of implementing safeguards and monitoring. Although a panel appointed by the Nigerian Air Force to investigate the tragedy presented its report to the Chief of Air Force in April, the report is yet to be made public and speculations about the bombing are rife. The Chief of Air Force has stated that the bombing was a human error. However, witnesses claim that the fighter jet circled the camp before it bombed the camp at least twice.

In view of the continuing patterns of abuse and potential for misuse of US-supplied equipment, and as a first step to accountability, the U.S. Congress should insist that the Nigerian government undertake independent investigation into all allegations of human rights violations by the military.  Any such reports on human rights violations by the military in northeast Nigeria should be released, including on the Rann bombing. Further, all victims should receive full reparation, including financial compensation.

As regards the intended transfer of the Tucano aircraft, Congress should ensure that Nigerian military personnel involved in its operation and command will be vetted carefully in full compliance with provisions of the Leahy Law, in order to screen out those responsible for past human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law.  Moreover, steps should be taken to ensure that personnel operating the equipment are adequately trained to comply with international human rights and humanitarian standards.

Furthermore, we ask you as Congressional leaders to insist on binding guarantees from the Nigerian government that the equipment will be used in conformity with US and international law.  Likewise, Congress should seek guarantees from the Trump Administration that the Department of Defense will effectively monitor the use of these aircraft for compliance with international human rights and humanitarian law.

Just a few weeks ago, Ambassador Nikki Haley made well-publicized comments drawing attention to the connection between widespread human rights violations and the breakdown of peace and security.  These comments underscore the risks attached to the intended transfer of the Tucano attack aircraft armed with its mounted machine guns, and the US must take seriously its responsibility to ensure that the transfer of this lethal equipment does not result in a further deterioration of human rights in Nigeria.  From your position of leadership in the US Congress, we urge you to convey these concerns to the Administration and seek guarantees that all precautions will be taken.

Sincerely,

Amnesty International USA
Peace Action
Peace Direct
Friends Committee on National Legislation.
21st Century Wilberforce Initiative
Jubilee Campaign USA
Act4Acountability
Association of Concerned Africa Scholars

Development4Security welcomes this guest blog post by Medinat Abdulazeez
PhD candidate, International Studies, University of Zurich
Junior Researcher, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Germany

As I stepped through the gates, what struck me first was the filth. Heaps of debris overflowing huge metal containers with flies buzzing over tiny fragments. Filth was everywhere. In overfilled dormitories and almost crumbling tents made of crooked tree stumps. In choked pits used as restrooms. In algae-infested water puddles caused by clogged drainages. It seems incomprehensible that people lived in these camps. Inconceivable that people eat and drink in such environment. People sleep on tattered mattresses or simply on worn-out wrappers spread on the sandy floors of the shack-like tents. People ma

Photo by the author, Inside Nigeria’s IDP camps.

ted and got married, people bore children, people raised children in these camps! People lived in these camps – no, people did not live in these camps, they just merely existed.

Children milled around, running, smiling and shrieking. The first and only sign of innocence. Their faces smacked with dry mucus and eye specks. Hair tangled and grey with soothe. Lack of water means daily baths were unaffordable luxuries. So mothers have learnt the ‘wiping method’: using a piece of cloth to wipe essential parts of the body, and the head or hair was not considered essential to this process. International Organizations have promised to come fill the tanks they brought with water. When water comes, the hairs will get a thorough wash.

Women sat largely in groups and chatted. Laughed at each other’s jokes and bantered endlessly. But the hollowness in their voices masked horrors they have witnessed in the hands of Boko Haram. The hollowness disguise scenes of watching loved ones butchered to death, of watching daughters being dragged away to be used as sex slaves by strangers with some crazy idea about building a new and glorious society by destroying the lives of the people around them. Together, these women are bound by their grief. Yet, in their grief, they remember to be different. To steer clear of women who have returned from Boko Haram camps with pregnancies or children. Their common grief does not equate them with women who have been raped and abused by camp officials or security agencies in IDP camps. In their grief, they do not forget to claim ‘purity’. Their grief is not common with the women they refuse to sit and chat with. With the women they gossip about and make fun of. No, in their grief, they remember to uphold stigmatizing traditions that relegate abused women to pitiable positions in the society. Forlorn, the ostracized women huddle together. They laugh gingerly at my jokes. But I know not to ask how they are or how they feel. The answer is obvious in their shallow looks, their sunken gestures. Grief has paralyzed their emotions but being stigmatized by their own kin just crystallizes their anguish. Traditions that do not forgive their kind of victimization were unkind, but unfortunately, traditions are what they are, traditions.

I wonder how camp and government officials sleep at night. Diverting aids and relief materials might seem normal in a country where government salaries do not suffice to pay a family’s monthly bills, but doing this to victims of Boko Haram’s insurgent and terrorist acts surely should feel different. How do they feel when they send trucks of grains meant for IDP camps to markets in other states? Does their skin gristle when they move packs of drugs from camp clinics to their personal dispensaries for sale? Do their hearts thump as they arrange mattresses, blankets and beddings into trucks at night for onward shipment to sell at urban markets? Do their pens tremble when they inflate IDP figures to increase allocations sent to each camp? Do they feel any shame when they invite family and friends into the camps to swell the population when important dignitaries visit? Do they believe their own lies when they announce that the IDPs are well taken care of? Do their chests not feel the weights of their deception? Do their rousing libidos not lull at the sight of the cheerless IDPs they sexually blackmail with relief materials originally meant for them? Is abandoning IDPs who get pregnant from a coercing camp official a part of camp officials’ responsibility to protect?

A sign in the middle of the camp says: National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) Authorized IDP Camp. Instantly, I am jolted to realization. The federal government is responsible for the welfare and wellbeing of the displaced persons. Then I wonder, is ‘government’ deaf? Dumb? Blind? Cold-Blooded? But government is made up of the people running it. And if the deplorable situations in these camps have gone on for such a long time without change, then those people are culpable by inaction and wrongdoings. Every child that dies of malnutrition; every woman that endures rape and sexual abuse from camp officials, soldiers or vigilantes in exchange for crumbs to survive or promises of marriage; every father that averts his eyes from seeing his teenage daughter pawn her dignity in the hope of bringing home a kilo of rice for her family; every bomb that goes off in IDP camps because security officials concentrate more on sexual gratification than protecting displaced persons; every woman that loses her sanity due to lack of proper medical care for victims of trauma; every woman that has endured the scorn of bearing the consequences of sexual abuse; every displaced person that has been victimized twice, first by Boko Haram, and now by people in whose hands their well-being has been entrusted; everything that is happening in IDP camps has proven that Boko Haram is not the only evil that needs confrontation.