I
was greatly relieved when news came last week that the military was
winding down its campaign in the Niger Delta, code-named Operation
Crocodile Smile. I had not heard of a smiling crocodile until the
Nigerian military mentioned it. I confess equally, that I do not exactly
know the kind of sound associated with crocs, but I should think since
they are classified as reptiles and deadly predators too, they should
hiss like snakes or growl and bark like wild dogs, rather than smile
like humans.
I have not also witnessed a crying croc,
until a branch of the armed agitators in the Niger Delta, called the
Greenlander said it could make crocs to actually shed tears and not in
the sense of the idiom – crocodile tears. Notwithstanding, it remains a
very tall prospect sourcing a creature that would cause the croc, the
undisputed lord of the swamp, to weep in any water or even land combat.
In the end, if there were really smiles
and tears, neither came from crocs in the Niger Delta. In fact, in the
profit and loss account of the battles of the Niger Delta, there were no
gains and therefore no smiles. It was all tears as all quarters posted
huge losses. There was as much pain on the side of the militants as it
was on the side of the military.
While the military might have done a
great deal of training in swimming pools in Warri and environs to built
ad-hoc capability for the amphibious operation in the Niger Delta, the
militants, given their locations, are natural amphibians. It is actually
like taking battle to the croc in the river. You may win because you
are better equipped but caution still remains the watchword. What the
militants lack in overall operational efficiency, they try to make up
with the advantages that nature bestows on them in the specific matter
at hand.
No soldier, including naval ratings can
stay in any military formation in Nigeria and have a full appreciation
of the difficulty of the Niger Delta terrain. The network of creeks and
rivulets intertwining at different locations and all opening into the
sea from different channels makes clear cut cognizance for operational
purposes a huge task. From one location to another is usually not as
straight forward as moving from Lagos to Ibadan or from Kano to
Maiduguri. Everywhere looks the same. The interconnectivity of the
waterways is intriguing, yet in this seeming confusion, there is clear
order. All the channels remain paths to specific destinations.
The awesomeness is heightened in the
rainy season when the terrain enjoys full measure and an outsider needs
real guts to navigate through threatening waters. And this thing about
low and high tide plays out so vividly to make the terrain even more
treacherous. You may go in one direction at the point of high tide, but
return through another when the tide is low because the earlier channel
might have been completely drained of water. This can complicate a naval
offensive to take out the militants. Also inconceivable is a wholesale
bombardment of the entire mangrove vegetation. Such will come with
incalculable collateral damage, including the complete incineration of
the oil and gas infrastructure, which the military is fighting to
protect against attacks by the militants. The military in top form is
highly constrained. It is not fighting an external aggression and so
cannot deploy its full might to deal with the issue.
For reasons already stated, I want to
believe that all sides are better informed about the task of causing the
crocodile to laugh or cry. It is not as simple as eating tuwo with
banga soup. It cannot be decisively settled in the battlefield which in
turn makes the point of coming to the negotiation table inevitable.
Last week, Senator Udoma Udo Uoma
exposed an interesting dimension about the issue of the day. He said the
economy did not stumble into a recession because the Federal Government
did not know what to do. He explained that from 2.2 million barrels per
day (mbd), crude oil production has been degraded by 50 per cent to
1.1mbd by the sustained bombings of oil facilities by the armed fighters
in the Niger Delta. Udoma was kind of saying that the recession is a
force majeure and there is little or nothing that President Buhari and
his brilliant team can do for now to save the situation.
Udoma was characteristically calm,
urbane and measured, even as he appealed for the triumph of reason over
emotion in the matter at hand. He explained that the 50 per cent
shut-ins in crude output translated to a corresponding loss in foreign
earnings. Former Governor of Central Bank and now Emir of Kano, Alhaji
Sanusi Lamido Sanusi had explained earlier in a different forum that the
loss of oil, which constitutes only 15 per of the GDP cannot knock the
lights out of Nigeria into a recession. Put differently, the Emir was
saying the problem at hand has more to do with inadequacy of ideas, than
it has to do with lack of resources.
I must confess that my understanding of
macroeconomics is not deep enough to state without fear of being
contradicted by bigger heads, who between Udoma and Sanusi, is on track
here. But I know something different, which is that Nigerians and not
crocs are the ones shedding tears. The tears are flowing freely from the
eyes of Nigerians who now have to pay extremely high prices in an
import-dependent economy, because there is no enough forex from oil
earnings to support importation of vital items, including rice, which
price has jumped from N8000 to N20000.
Efforts towards at calming the raging
oil region are reportedly in top gear. This is very cheering. But it is
important also to advise government to avoid mistakes of the past in
order to produce different results. Already, all manner of persons and
groups have begun masquerading as true representatives of the peoples of
the Niger Delta. The big economy of negotiation in the region, which
has also fallen into recession, is beginning to revive. This is
dangerous and government should watch out.
Therefore, the first step in the
engagement process is for government to know with whom to negotiate to
avoid falling into the wrong hands because the season has started
breeding con men and women. Any rash approach will convert the
negotiation with the militants and even Boko Haram fighters into another
business venture in some quarters. For instance, insisting that
reconciliation with the wanted militant leader, Government Oweizide
Ekpemupolo alias Tompolo is not central to a fair deal will not be
helpful. And there are a thousand and one people out there in the Niger
Delta who will be pushing this fraudulent position for their own
ascendancy.
While to the authorities, Tompolo is a
barefaced criminal, but having single-handedly provided a facelift and
brought heavy official presence to Okerenkoko his birthplace, he is
about the only ‘government’ that his people know. They are likely to
listen more to him than they will listen the Delta State governor or
even the president. That is the truth.
Honest official intelligence would
confirm also that Tompolo is about the only Niger Delta fighter with a
vision that is larger than himself. It is the other way round with many
others, including the large colony of Niger Delta activists who are
merely escalating the issues in the region as bait to bargain for
personal benefits.
This is on one hand. On the other hand,
even if the right representatives of the people are ultimately tracked
for the negotiation, government must aspire to come to the table with a
fresh package. If half of the lost oil earnings since the start of the
bombings were to be used to intervene in the issues for determination,
we surely would have gone beyond the point of causing crocs to smile or
weep.
In other words if the official
disposition is to gain respite from the current economic heat occasioned
by production shut-ins, after which it will be business as usual, then
practically nothing would have been achieved from the ongoing peace
efforts.
Abraham Ogbodo is a columnist at the Guardian from where this article is culled from The Guardian.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
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