By Dr. Samuel B Artley DMD. FAGD.
Our great grandparents, grandparents, most of our parents and some of us today were raised and lived a life stuck in the ways of the dinosaurs; they stood by and watch events unfold. We all know what happened to the dinosaurs; they became extinct.
Africa is much too versatile a survivor for extinction but rather it will be further marginalized into the position of a vestigial land should this prevailing trend in Nigeria be allowed to continue any further.
These military interests of Africa would be best secured by African leadership, African governments, and all African citizens who must have and show interest in the welfare of their fellow Africans.
Today our big brother in Nigeria is hurting. Boko Haram has inflicted serious wounds on her pride; like our African dads, pride has prevented Nigeria from asking for help especially from the younger, smaller, poorer, African brother and sister nations.
At this moment all of West Africa and all capable African nations must wake up, stop pretending to be asleep, and stop ignoring the fact on the ground, because certainly they will not resolve themselves, nor will they go away; the facts on the ground has to be dealt with. Africa’s interest would only be secured from within and not from outside i.e. [Extra- African countries]
Remember when half a million, 1 million or 2 million were killed in Rwanda. While all of Africa kept on pretending as if asleep or the problem will resolve itself hopefully by these scenarios.
- when the Rwandans get tired
- when the Rwandans run out of people to kill they almost did
- by divine intervention
Meanwhile the massacre went on and on and on for a good while. What a disgrace that was. These 54 independent African nations sat idly by and watched, not even one showed up. Modern day Africans must break away from the ways of our dinosaur ancestors. These African governments must not stand by and watch like the true dinosaurs did.
What good are all those mighty military generals and their armies, their air forces and naval fleets within Africa? So far they have proven to be insignificant in the greater arena of their own motherland and her internal security. What positive value have these current armies contributed to containing the repercussion in the fall out post Gaddafi, the everlasting war in Congo, and now Boko Haram in Nigeria?
Much credit should be given to their role in Liberia, such performance should serve as a poster child for ECOMOG at its best. That was a template through which all future African conflict resolution should be measured against.
As of today within Africa, 2.1 million armed soldiers roam these 54 states; that makes Africa the largest standing army in the world. On paper, that sounds very impressive! It sounds like she could be a formidable foe but the actual reality is, that 2.1 million is not any more formidable than the strongest enclave within the continent. This collective weakness in total military capability is due to the compartmentalization of the continent as it is today. With each enclave having their own armed forces well contained within their borders, at the same time there is no true alliance or corporation among these enclaves.
Africa’s enemies in this generation and the next will not be foreign invaders, foreign air fleet, or foreign armadas. The enemies of Africa are mostly foot soldiers, at best fleets of SUV’s packed to capacity with local thugs. This is the direction Africa’s defense should be geared to and prepared to confront. This has to be a collective defense strategy; the current status quo of all African states for their independent national defense is just the usual African mirage. Like all such illusion there is nothing of significant value at the end, such is the fate of all these independent African armies.
Unless the entire defense resource of sub-Saharan Africa is concentrated to face such internal demons, motherland Africa will continue to see its enclaves, overrun by such thugs, at a regular interval of every 5 years. All it takes to set a country back 40 years is six months of anarchy; the math is not in Africa’s favor. Meanwhile, the list of the devastated continues to grow in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Rwanda, Timbuktu in Mali, etc.
Help from extra- African countries is a reluctant help, such help is slow to come. The actual reality is this help has been coming less and less frequently; when they do come, they are often much too late, like in the case of Rwanda, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, etc. Often by the time help arrives the ailing enclave is already set back 40 plus years.
Africans cannot fault other extra-African countries for not rushing to send their sons and daughters to die in Africa, why should they? After all they do not have a dog in the fight. Africans have dogs in these fights; African people must fight these battles when and where they crop up from the very beginning. Failure to do so then will simply be postponing the fight for a later day; by that later day, the fight will be right at your door steps. What then? But join the line and wait for extra-African help at one of the many UN refugee camps somewhere in Africa.
For the purpose of self-reflection, these are factual statistics all Africans should become very familiar with.
Population of West Africa———————————————- 340 million
Population of Nigeria—————————————————- 174 million
Number of people killed by Boko Haram 2013 -2014 ———– 10,340 Nigerians + 400 kidnapped
Number of people killed in Ukraine so far ————————– 4020
Ongoing conflict in Ukraine to date has 4000 plus killed, resulting to complete mobilization of all Europeans. Nigeria is 50% of West Africa’s population with 10,000 plus killed. So far only Chad and Cameroon have mobilized and joined the fight. West Africa as a whole cannot afford to find out how scenarios will play themselves out in Nigeria but rather West African states must engage militarily and participate in shaping the eventual outcome.
These thugs in SUV’s are the enemies within; today it is big brother Nigeria, for sure, within the next five years it will be somewhere else, perhaps Guinea, perhaps Congo, Ghana no one knows. But one thing for sure anarchy is coming to your peaceful enclave. Knowing the obvious that the demon lies from within, she will occasionally rise from within, it is the duty and right of the collective African society to be able to handle such security or defense issues swiftly and efficiently from among its self and not from extra- African nations.
Now is that moment, the urgency is immediate, that all West African states should rise up, man up and present their own quota and take the fight to Boko Haram. Failure of any West African state to do so is haram, with the exception of ground zero Ebola states.
Dr. Samuel Artley is a contributor to Gainako who is passionate about Africa’s ability to address its own problems. He believes Africa has the resources to solve its own problems without external intervention. Watch this space for Dr. Artley’s well written and Practical solution oriented ideas on Africa.