"The recommendation is contained in a bulky report titled: “Towards a New Dawn in Nigeria post 2015.” It is a compendium of papers, suggestions, analyses, and reports presented by, scholars and policy practitioners assembled by former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Mr. Obasanjo assembled the think-tank of experts, as special committees of the Centre for Human Security of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, to provide actionable and “innovative” policy recommendations for President Muhammadu Buhari to tackle myriad of challenges – particularly those of security, economy, education, and infrastructure – facing Nigeria.
The recommendation of recruiting Fulani herdsmen to confront Boko Haram insurgents was made by a team led by Ahmed Joda and consisted of Nuhu Ribadu, Steve Orosanye, Tunji Olagunju, George Obiozor, Yusufu Pam, and Peter Okebukola.
Mr. Joda was also head of the transition committee set up by President Muhammadu Buhari before his inauguration while most of the others held various positions during the Obasanjo presidency with Mr. Ribadu being the internationally acclaimed pioneer chairman of Nigeria’s major anti-corruption agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC].
Noting the socio-economic conditions which provide easy recruits for Boko Haram, the team stated that, “a Boko Haram recruit is offered a juicy pay in a milieu where joblessness pervades”.
Five Steps
In its recommendation, the team made a five-point proposition, covering finance, recruitment, accountability, reward, as well as schedule and propaganda.
It asked the Defence Ministry to determine the battle fronts where the herdsmen would be needed and the specific number and duration of service to ensure accountability of the process. This, according to the report, will involve working in collaboration with civilian Joint Task Force.
According to the report, the second step would involve the Presidency and the National Assembly. After the Defence Ministry and Civilian JTF must have concluded issues of finance, personnel, and logistics, the presidency should present the case to the National Assembly for urgent approval of funds needed.
Subsequently, a joint team of defence officials, civilian JTF and heads of Fulani herdsmen would be commissioned to recruit and pay the volunteers with accurate records kept.
The fourth proposal involves saddling the Federal Ministry of Information, National Orientation Agency, as well as public and private media houses with war propaganda.
They are to embark on “intensive broadcast of jingles to the general public and use propaganda to cause panic in the ranks of the insurgents.”
Similarly, the team proposed that agencies of the federal and state governments, vigilante groups, telecommunication companies and non-governmental organisations should dissipate efforts towards massive enlightenment about how the insurgents, not government troops, are killing people and the success stories of government’s efforts. The enlightenment should also include committing religious leaders like the Sultan of Sokoto and other Islamic scholars to condemn terrorism and “preach true tenets of Islam”.
In its last proposition on the use of Fulani herdsmen to confront Boko Haram, the team proposed that the National Intelligence Agency, State Security Service and the media are to provide “random monitoring of the Fulani herdsmen especially during pay period to ensure they are getting their agreed payments”.
Use hunters too
In another recommendation off conventional military deployment, the think-tank also asked the federal government to adopt the “Mubi Model” of supporting, rewarding, and arming hunters to fight Boko Haram.
The Mubi model refers to the incident in November 2014 when a group of hunters and local vigilante mobilised and successfully liberated Mubi and other towns in Adamawa State hitherto occupied by the Boko Haram sect.
The think-tank therefore urged the federal government and governments of the insurgency-ravaged North-Eastern states to “review the vigilante strategy and support volunteer hunters with generous welfare, military training and light weapons” and provide “corruption free reward system to the vigilantes that is sustainable and competitive to Boko Haram financial offers.”
The committee’s recommendation of using herdsmen and hunters to fight Boko Haram is to supplement the efforts of the Nigerian military.
It urged the consolidation of the military campaign, as well as motivation and provision of adequate equipment for the military to be able to defeat the insurgents whose actions have caused the death of about 20,000 people, mostly in Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa states since 2009."
http://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/headlines/188828-exclusive-use-fulani-herdsmen-hunters-to-fight-boko-haram-joda-ribadu-others-advise-buhari.html
Or this:
Sudanese government use of ethnic militias for counterinsurgency
"Until the late 1990s, the fighters referred to as Janjaweed, although overwhelmingly Arab, appear to have been loosely organized groups from different backgrounds.
126 But the Sudanese government has a long history of using Arab and non-Arab ethnic militias to fight rebels who sprang from their traditional enemies.
127
The government of President Nimeiri (1969-1985) initially armed
muraheleen, Baggara (Arab) tribal militias of the Rizeigat from southern Darfur and Misseriya from southern Kordofan against southern rebels.
128 In 1989 the muraheleen were incorporated into official government militias controlled by the army and continued to receive government support for the purpose of attacking Dinka and Nuer civilians, whose men had joined the southern rebel SPLA (formed in 1983). The government arming of Baggara men with superior weapons turned a usually manageable conflict into a one-sided orgy of slaughter of civilians, looting, burning—and slave-taking in northern Bahr El Ghazal.
129
That template has now been imposed on Darfur, where some Arab nomads are given automatic arms and free rein to attack their usual African sparring partners, in the name of government counterinsurgency.
130
Many or most of the Janjaweed leaders were emirs or
omdas from Arab tribes, and several were appointed by the government in the administrative reorganization of the mid-1990s. The participation by ethnic-political leaders leads to increasing ethnic polarization as members of one ethnic group are summoned and recruited by their leaders to join in a free-for-all war against another ethnic group.
The Janjaweed are not simply a few side-lined ostracized outlaws, as the government suggests. Among the leaders participating in the war in Darfur against the Fur, Masalit, and Zaghawa are:
- Hamid Dawai, an emir of the Beni Halba tribe and Janjaweed leader in the Terbeba-Arara-Bayda triangle where 460 civilians were killed between August 2003 and April 2004.131 He has residences in Geneina and Bayda.
- Abdullah abu Shineibat, an emir of the Beni Halba tribe and Janjaweed leader in the Habila-Murnei area. He has residences in Geneina and Habila.
- Omda Saef, an omda of the Awlad Zeid tribe and leader of the Janjaweed from Geneina to Misterei. He has a residence in Geneina.
- Omar Babbush, an omda of the Misseriya tribe and leader of the Janjaweed from Habila to Forbranga, with a residence in Forbranga.
- Ahmad Dekheir, an omda of the Ma’alia tribe and leader of the Janjaweed in Murnei.
In recent months, Masalit say, some of the Janjaweed have been organized into structured
liwa, or brigades. Rebel leaders say they have identified six Janjaweed brigades. Masalit civilians, however, were able to name only two –
Liwa al-Jammous, or Buffalo Brigade, formerly headed by Musa Hilal, and
Liwa al-Nasr, or Victory Brigade, formerly headed by Shukurtallah.
These brigades are organised along the lines of the Sudanese army and headed by officers who wear the same stripes as generals in the regular army. The only difference between Janjaweed and army uniforms, Masalit say, is a badge depicting an armed horseman that the Janjaweed sport on their breast pocket. They drive the same Land Cruisers as the army and are accompanied by armed bodyguards. They carry the same Thuraya satellite phones as senior army officers.
The government compensates the Janjaweed officers and militia members. The homes, cars, and satellite phones are part of the compensation for the officers. They are also paid monthly stipends or salaries, according to Masalit interviewed separately, at different times and in different places. Four different persons agreed on the exact amounts - £300,000 Sudanese pounds a month (U.S. $ 117 as of mid-2003) for a man with a horse or camel, and £200,000 a month (U.S. $ 79) for a man without – roughly twice as much as a soldier of similar rank.
132
Idriss, forty-three-year-old leader of a local Masalit self-defense group in Gozbeddine near Habila, said payments to Janjaweed in his area came from the government:
In August 2003, the government said all Arabs who came with a horse or a camel would get a salary of £300,000 and a gun. The Arabs weren’t organised before; it was only groups of thirty or forty attacking civilians for their cows. When I was in Habila, there was an office for organizing the Janjaweed. It flew the Sudanese flag. It used to be a PDF office.
133
Another person, a former police officer, said top Janjaweed officers receive as much as £600,000 Sudanese (U.S. $ 233), a respectable sum in a poor country.
A friend in the Janjaweed once told me he was paid £300,000 Sudanese. He got it from an office near the mosque in Geneina. Some soldiers say the top brass in the Janjaweed get double that…
134
That many Janjaweed apparently now receive regular salaries suggests a degree of organisation and direction never enjoyed by “Arab nomads”.
High-ranking civil servants, themselves not Janjaweed, appear to have a role in recruiting Janjaweed. In a document obtained by Human Rights Watch, the state governor or
wali of South Darfur orders commissioners “to recruit 300 horsemen for Khartoum”.
135 The letter, dated November 22, 2003, is from the office of the governor to commissioners of
mahaliyas136—one of Nyala and the other of Kas, the capital and a large town in South Darfur, respectively.
It thanks the commissioners on behalf of the state minister of the interior and the governor for their “efforts against the rebels,” which were “highly appreciated.” It reaffirms a commitment to an agreement made between the minister and the commissioners “on all actions against the rebels” and asks the commissioners to implement it. The letter next lists promised donations and projects, apparently to benefit the janjaweed community, which include a campaign to vaccinate camels and horses; building of three classrooms and donation of books, desk, and clothes for students; construction of a health unit and donation of twenty-four hand pumps for eight villages.
137
In Darfur, the government is also recruiting criminals to spearhead this counterinsurgency operation, with predictable results. The most prominent Janjaweed leader in West Darfur state is Abdul Rahim Ahmad Mohammed, a former army officer known universally by his nickname of “Shukurtallah.”
138 He emerged at the head of the Janjaweed in Dar Masalit after he was arrested on charges of killing civilians.
Shukurtallah is a member of the Mahariya ethnic group
from Arbukni village just outside Geneina. He reportedly served in the Sudanese army in Juba for several years in the late 1990s before being transferred back to Geneina. In 1999, according to Masalit residents of Geneina, he was taken to court by relatives of men he was accused of killing. He was sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment, but was released and soon after appeared at the head of the Janjaweed forces in Dar Masalit.
Ahmad, a Masalit farmer from the Geneina area, said his family encountered Shukurtallah twice while Shukurtallah was still in the army – in 1994 and 1999:
In 1994, the army came to my village, Habila Canare, with Shukurtallah. He was a very tall, thin, cruel man, with a scarred lip. He hit me and jailed me for two months. He told me: “You are a rebel!” In 1999, he took me from Naga village, near my home, and imprisoned me for thirty-five days.
139
In 2003, Ahmad’s brother, Mohieddine, was stopped by Janjaweed at one of the exits to Geneina. They demanded a large payment on groundnut oil he was carrying. When he protested that he had no money, they sent him to their “leader” in Janjaweed offices in the Medina al Hujjaj – the old customs yard in Geneina. There he found himself face to face with Shukurtallah:
He asked me: “How did you know my place?” I told him his men sent me there. He wrote a letter to the Janjaweed saying: “Let him go.” All the burning, all the looting was Shurkurtallah’s. He had one office in the army barracks and another in the Medina al Hujjaj. Sometimes we saw him in army cars and sometimes with the Janjaweed on horses. He was a very cruel man.
140
While many of the leaders who rallied their fellow tribesmen to form militias call themselves “general”, ordinary Masalit call them “mounted criminals” or, more simply, “thieves”. Ali, a Masalit who left the police force after twelve years’ service, said many of them had been arrested and jailed for theft:
I was a policeman. The Janjaweed are Arab criminals. Some come from jail and then are trained by the army in Geneina - in the old customs yard, Medina al Hujjaj. Shineibat, Hamid Dawai - Janjaweed generals, but thieves! Just like many of the men who serve under them: Idman… Brema Labid… Ali Manzoul… All thieves! All released from jail.
141
Aqid Younis, a Janjaweed leader in Habila, has a reputation in the area as a cattle rustler. Yousif, a farmer from the nearby village of Abun, said Younis has been notorious in the area for years:
He’s a thief, but they never put him in prison. He was a nomad before, in the bush, but in 2003 he moved into Habila. We saw him travelling in army cars to Geneina.
142
The Janjaweed are not only persons whose criminal past is forgiven, they are also assured that they will not have to face local criminal prosecution for any of the crimes committed while pursuing and evicting, looting and pillaging, the ethnic groups allegedly aligned with the rebels.
Nureddine from Misterei village resigned from the police force in 2003 after “the government took the Arab tribes and allowed them to be the law, over everyone else”. Abaker said the army chief in Misterei, a Dinka from southern Sudan called Ango, ordered the police “not to interfere with the Janjaweed. To let them do whatever they wanted.”
143
Ahmad, a thirty-five-year-old farmer, said friends in the police force in Geneina were also told not to take action of any kind against Janjaweed:
We spent two months in Geneina early this year after our village was burned. Some people brought their cattle with them, but the Janjaweed stole them inside Geneina. Friends in the police force told me they were told not to lodge any complaints against the Janjaweed. They were not to interfere with them in any way.
144
The Janjaweed do not attempt to conceal their crimes, but they have attempted to conceal the organized and extensive nature of their military operations and logistical support system, at least in the larger towns. They are apparently treated secretly in hospital facilities in Geneina, capital of West Darfur state. A nurse from the government hospital who entered these facilities one day said she was ordered to leave immediately:
The Janjaweed asked me: ““What are you doing here? You are not allowed here.” Doctors from our hospital told me they worked there secretly at night. It paid well, they said.
145
The hospital, formerly a private house, carries no signs identifying it as a hospital and is said to be used exclusively by Janjaweed. "
#RANCH THE CATTLE TO SAVE NIGERIAN FARMERS FROM FULANI HERDSMEN!
