The spreading northern insurgency

http://www.economist.com/node/21542764

Economist

14 January 2011

Nigeria

The spreading northern insurgency

The government must think hard about how to tackle an Islamist uprising that may have less to do with religion than the rebels claim

AS THE muffled boom of a distant bomb set off by militants gives way seconds later to the clatter of government soldiers’ automatic gunfire, Satu Mari listens in the car park of the hotel he owns in Maiduguri, a city in Nigeria’s turbulent north-east. “Bomb is our daily bread,” he says casually. “Bomb is our good morning and good night.” Maiduguri is sliding towards a full-blown guerrilla war and Mr Mari runs one of the few businesses with a bright future. He lodges army officers.

The government is sending thousands of troops to Nigeria’s north to fight Islamist militants said to have emerged from a small cult in the past decade. Known as Boko Haram, it is blamed for nearly every act of violence now occurring in Africa’s most populous nation, some 160m-strong. After a wave of attacks on banks and prisons in late 2010, the militants are said to have moved up a notch, murdering politicians and poll workers in the run-up to elections in March and April last year. They are also blamed for bombs that went off at the heavily guarded national police headquarters and at the offices of the UN in the capital, Abuja. And for the second year in a row Boko Haram is said to have attacked Christmas church services.

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Yet the Nigerian state has shown it can end an insurgency if it plays its cards right. Until a few years ago most political violence in Nigeria took place in the Niger delta in the south. Just as in today’s north, residents complained of corruption, poverty, inequality and lack of development. Some delta people backed armed groups; others benefited from their largesse. In the first nine months of 2008, 1,000 or so people were killed in the unrest and nearly 300 taken hostage. Over the years, the cost to Nigeria through pipeline sabotage and oil theft was estimated at nearly $24 billion.

But a deal in 2009 that included an amnesty brought relative peace to the region. Militants were offered an unconditional pardon and cash. Around 26,000 accepted. According to official figures, 15,000-plus former militants have had vocational training or a formal if belated education.

Though the delta is much safer, the amnesty programme has yet to bring total peace. And it has been expensive. Repentant militants each got $393 a month in cash plus food allowances during rehabilitation. In this year’s government’s budget, $458m will be spent on sustaining the amnesty—more than is given to the Universal Basic Education Commission, which provides free primary education. Some say Boko Haram’s real aim is not an Islamist state but a slice of the amnesty cake. If so, the government should at least explore such a possibility.