Pains of Paris, tears of Yola, new lessons from the attacks By Adeola Akinremi

Last Friday was a black Friday for the French people. It was a night the Eagles of Death Metal, an American rock band from Palm Desert, California, United States, was rocking the city of Paris with melodious music. In the midst of joy, grief came as terrorists visited the concert venue and five other locations in Paris with multiple attacks.
As a newshound I must stay awake to follow the breaking news in order not to miss the most important part of the story. The coordinated attacks that experts have now said must have been deliberate and carefully planned work of several months is now making countries think about their foreign policies. The current debate in the United States is centered on the demand by more than 30 states in the federation calling for rejection of Syrian refugees into the United States. They echoed the phrase, “we should be safe and not be sorrowful.” Their stance is based on the revelation that two of the terrorists who carried out the murderous attacks in Paris, where at least 129 people died with hundreds injured, allegedly arrived in Greece as a Syrian refugee, and walked their way into Paris using the window provided by the Shengen agreement and European Union on open borders. No sentiment, the debate in the United States is between the ruling and opposition party. It is Republicans versus Democrats as seen in the lineup of state governors and congressmen asking for a halt to Syrian refugees’ entrance into the US.

In all, it has been called a religious test for refugees by America’s President Barack Obama who described the call to reject Syrian refugees as shameful. But in the days ahead Obama may weigh his options carefully with a Congress that appears to be giving tacit support to the request of the governors.

In France, where strikes raised a disturbing question of how Europe’s porous borders can increase terrorism risk, the French Government responded by closing its borders first and thereafter maintaining a tight control after a relax. Without doubt, the coordinated attacks at six different locations in Paris jolted the world. The attacks in Paris; the claim by ISIS and the brag hours after, that terrorist group will reach the heart of the United States soon by attacking the Washington DC, the capital of the United States and other places should indeed be a recipe for concern for the Nigerian government at this critical time.

The gain made by the ISIS in Paris may provide motivation for terrorists everywhere to raise their ugly heads and do copycats, if government fails to double the effort to completely crush terrorist cells anywhere around the country at this time.

Unfortunately for us, the next bomb after Paris has now gone off in Yola, the capital of Adamawa State, killing more than 30 of our citizens. The city of Kano was equally bombed on Wednesday afternoon. Coincidentally, the Yola attack happened just four days after Paris was attacked and three days after President Muhammadu Buhari left Yola, declaring that the Islamist militant movement, Boko Haram, has been decapitated. Undoubtedly, Yola has become the epicenter of Boko Haram activities in Nigeria, after villages of Borno State, where terrorism is more pronounced.

Interestingly, people all over the world, including Nigerians who damped their personal images with the flag of France on social media as a show of solidarity with the French people, didn’t remember Nigeria also had darkest hours on Tuesday and Wednesday. What a double standards! Critically, the world is witnessing a change in pattern of attacks by the terrorist groups, different from what we are used to with Al Qaeda members in the cave of Afghanistan.

There’s now a major shift in strategy by terrorist networks. The terrorists are now young, street-smart and tech savvy individuals bounded in a network of evil to kill and to destroy. They are using encrypted communication and special apps to cover their tracks and leaving government and investigators confused. As a country, it will be too dangerous for us to concentrate our war against terrorism in one place called Borno State or the northeast at this critical time.

So, as we see unexpected cities like Paris buckled under terrorism, we need to place special surveillance around our transport system throughout the country. And because road, railway, air, and water transports have been used by terrorists to carry out their dastard acts, this one piece of meat may be an important area of cooperation between the new Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi, and the Department of State Services (DSS).

In the past, security experts have pointed the government attention to our many porous borders, but it is debatable if something concrete was done by the previous administration on such serious issue of porous border. That will be another place the Buhari government needs to quickly deploy its arsenal to safe the country from embarrassing invasion. Let’s be very clear, Nigerians who have been radicalised and completely brainwashed are in Syria and if what happened in France may provide a note of warning to us, the probability that they may also head home for attack shouldn’t be downplayed.

These are people who believe they are part of historical moment and excited about their new found homes and friends, though only for evil act. We need to beef up intelligence with the western world, especially since Boko Haram is known to have pledged allegiance to Islamic State and killed thousands of people in the northeastern part of the country during the last six years with daring expansion of its cells to the south. You must know your enemy if you want to defeat them. Simple!

The known global statistics of killings by the militants in Nigeria is frightening and should strengthen the resolve of the government to do everything to protect all Nigerians in an “all lives matter,” pronouncement. In a list of 10 of the world’s worst attacks in 2015, Nigeria occupied number one, six and nine.

For the number one position, the January 3rd attack in Baga, where about 2,000 people reportedly died was considered in a report by National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), a research center based at the University of Maryland, United States. The kukawa attack on mosques, where 145 people died made Nigeria again featured in the report as number six. The number nine position was arrived at by using the Boko Haram attack on Maiduguri on September 20, where at least 117 were killed in the city when attackers hit a mosque and killed football fans watching a televised match, as well as bystanders. So with Nigeria ranked 2nd country after Iraq where more than 100 people were killed by terrorist attacks 13 times on a single day from 2000-2014, Nigeria has probably lost more people than the rest of the world, except Iraq, yet we are not taking the statistics seriously.

The Paris, Yola and Kano attacks serve as a tragic reminder that terrorism isn’t just going away and Nigeria can’t seek repose, though the success the military is recording in the northeast.