Courage In The Face Of Terror

Courage In The Face Of Terror

By Ibrahim Musa

It is rather unfortunate that the otherwise impotent militia group alias Boko Haram has become more audacious and bold with every new attack it launches on the innocent citizens. The latest onslaught on Kano which has yet again proven the vulnerability of our security system, and left many of us in doubt about whether we are really doing what is ought to be done even symbolically. Many of us chose to conveniently avoid coming forward to clearly show courage when it was needed the most.

I have listened to many messages from our leaders which were mostly garnished with similar cliche of sympathizing with the traditional and constitutional leaderships of Kano and condolence to the victims’ families. They carried shrieked calls for dialogue; which I consider defeatist. Even the constituted leadership, both at local and national levels, seemed obviously overwhelmed. They failed to act like the field commanders when faced with a menacing enemy that is all out to exterminate their demoralized troops. What was expected at the critical moment like that when almost everybody seemed to have lost confidence in the ability of our respective governments to protect the life of their citizenry, is for the same leadership to seize such opportunity and show courage by inspiring its people and making speeches that would turn the table against this enemy of state,  Boko Haram. Psychologically, human being wants his action to be popular, so in the event where it’s roundly condemned he would be left with no option other than to search for justification or to denounce his action. We had seen that with Madallah Bombing, where the same Boko Haram were evidently disturbed by the outrage that greeted their actions which probably prompted the circulation of some denials in the Black Berry Messenger and some other media, by those who were behind the perpetration of that heinous act.  It was apparently also what forced the visibly shaken Shekau to release an amateur Youtube video clip laden with cracked voice and visible fine tremors; mildly suppressed by an unusually oversize thick ‘Asuwaki’. Surprisingly, the same Shekau released another clip post January Kano attack sounding defiant and more confident. Unlike the other one on Madalla, the latest clip was full of triumphant message and threats of escalating the violence to hitherto unaffected western education schools and the families of those who stood against them. He even dismissed as a trash the offer of a dialogue from the fear mortified ‘yanboko’ at the helm of Nigeria’s affairs.

Here is what I thought our leaders in Kano would do immediately post the attack when it dawned on us that the attack was the most sophisticated of all since the emergence of the now dreaded local terror group. The local leadership should have given a state-wide broadcast to condemn the attack and use the opportunity to let those attackers that we are largely Muslims and across the world we are respected as the hub of Islamic civilization, trade and knowledge. We cannot fold our arms to allow aliens to impose their warped understanding of religion on us; which has gone contrary to the teachings of holy Prophet Muhammad (SAW) and his rightly guided caliphs. If such criminal actions are tolerable to Islam, Caliph Ali (RTA) wouldn’t have fought against the violent Khawareej. Islam does not condone senseless killings of women, children, elderly, sick and unarmed. Life is considered sacred in Islam and there are stringent conditions which have to be met before a soul is taken, but none of these was obtainable under our settings yet we were attacked by those criminally insane goons. We view this attack as an attack on Islam by those who are hell bent on destroying the gains of this fastest growing religion. Why targeting innocent people of Kano who are going about their daily legitimate business?

We must rally together to see the end of terror groups and their evil machinations. We need our leaders to understand the enormity power at their disposal and the burden of leadership resting squarely on their shoulders. Governments should invest heavily and responsibly in education, and provision of necessary infrastructure to make life easy on its citizens. We should never let depraved/barbaric illiterates to cow us into silence with their murder instinct. We all have only one soul and at the appointed time, we would die. So death is inevitable and its fear should not stop us from facing those criminal gangs that are all out to exterminate humanity and take us centuries back to the Stone Age.

NB: I wrote this piece in February 2012, a few weeks after the Boko Haram January attack on Kano.