North and West Africa (UK Response)

Sandra Osborne Excerpts

Thursday 3rd July 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sandra Osborne (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Lab)]

The Foreign Affairs Committee report is important, and unfortunately it did not get the coverage that it deserved when it was published. I wonder whether that would still be the case today, given everything that has happened in the region, especially in Nigeria.

The spread of jihadist groups in the region is becoming more and more apparent, and it represents a new front line in violent extremism, which is spreading and becoming increasingly assertive and networked. We are concerned by the seeming failure of the states concerned and the international community to anticipate events and respond quickly, despite the statement in the Government’s response to our report that the UK and its partners had identified Mali, the Central African Republic and the wider Sahel region as being at risk of conflicts several years earlier due to the factors the Committee identified in our report. Those factors included weak governance, failure to address historic disputes, ungoverned spaces and organised crime, as well as the presence of terrorist groups. That prompts the question, why was more timely action not taken? What lessons can be learned and what is to be done now to stem the escalation of those problems?

Among the report’s recommendations, we make the point that the UK Government should match the rhetoric of their ambitions to increase their political, security and economic engagement with the region with substantive diplomatic input and resources. Even within the current financial restraints, they should make it a priority to support humanitarian efforts where people, especially women and girls, are being displaced and subjected to the most heinous atrocities. The prioritisation of such action is entirely consistent with the Government’s initiative on tackling violence against women and girls in conflict, and I know that the Department for International Development is doing a lot of work in northern Nigeria. Such action is also a priority if we are to protect the UK’s long-term interests and play a leading role with France and the US in developing an international security and stability policy for that region.

Although I am a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I joined the Committee mid-way through the inquiry, so I participated mainly in the aspects of the report that relate to Nigeria. The Committee’s visit to Nigeria was one of the most shocking experiences I have had during my time as a member of the Defence Committee and, now, the Foreign Affairs Committee. There is no doubt that violent extremism has taken root because of the inadequacy or absence of state institutions and the abandonment of huge sections of the population in remote and marginalised—mainly Muslim—areas, where the need to address socio-economic disadvantage has been met by complacency, even though Nigeria is the richest country in Africa. The country has been unable to provide security for its people.

Government officials in Nigeria informed us during our visit that measures will be taken to tackle unemployment and poverty, and they said that they recognised the link between deprivation and extremism, but more action is needed, rather than words. The fact that the Government have undertaken to work with international and regional bodies to build resilience and capacity to prevent state structures from being overwhelmed is welcome, but those structures have already been overwhelmed. In Borno state, it has been reported that Boko Haram has free rein in the area. It is doing what it likes, when it likes. Far from defeating those forces, the state of emergency declared more than a year ago in north-east Nigeria has failed to curb the Islamist insurgency and attacks have increased. In the past couple of months, Boko Haram has attacked several military bases. It is extending its reach beyond its remote north-eastern heartlands, and on two occasions has bombed a bus terminal in the capital, Abuja. Only last week, it bombed an upmarket shopping district in the capital, killing 21 people. As we all know, in April it kidnapped 276 schoolgirls from Chibok, an event that shocked the world.

The military have no public credibility because of their record of human rights abuses, and they lack modern equipment, training and motivation. They also lack air cover, and they requested help in that area from the US and the UK while we were in the country. Compared with the size of the population, the military are small in number and do not have the capacity to prosecute large-scale counter-insurgency operations. As the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Croydon South (Sir Richard Ottaway), has said, there are constraints on the military support that the UK can provide because of human rights concerns, which have been highlighted by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. The sale of lethal weapons is prohibited by UK law because of those concerns. That is a Catch-22 situation, because without training, the Nigerian military cannot get equipment or dramatically improve their capacity. Without those, they will remain weak in the face of the most ruthless and determined attacks from Boko Haram.

The UK has a large Nigerian diaspora and trading links with Nigeria, so UK bilateral input to that part of the region is particularly relevant. I therefore support the Committee’s recommendation that the UK Government should provide as much security and intelligence as is consistent with their human rights values. However, years of intensive commitment will surely be required for that to have any real effect. I wonder how much the international community and the regional groupings, including the African Union, are committed to that.

Inadequate military capacity is only one of the impediments to addressing the insurgency. Political will, accountability and credibility are also key to regaining stability and preventing the continuation of radicalisation. At the moment, the political leadership of the three states in the north-east is aligned with the opposition All Progressives Congress. On 14 May, the BBC reported that Mr Ledum Mitee, a former activist from the same region as President Goodluck Jonathan, had been quoted as saying:

“People around the President, his closest allies, all tell him this Boko Haram is manufactured by the northerners to play politics… This leads him to distance himself from the whole affair.”

He also said that the military commanders have to play politics because if

“they give the impression it is a very bad situation, they risk being branded incompetent, so they give a less bad picture to their bosses.”

He went on to say that when the crisis erupts, no one is able to deal with it effectively because it is so confused. That is just one person’s analysis, and he is probably no friend of the president, but if that was the situation previously, recent developments have surely proved that Boko Haram is only too real.

At the meeting last night, chaired by the Speaker and attended by Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, I was pleased to hear that the president has been meeting with people across the political spectrum and across civil society to bring the people of Nigeria together at this time of crisis. She also said that the search is being stepped up with a greater and better equipped Nigerian army presence to take on Boko Haram in the northern states.

The recent relentless violence—including a bomb in a vehicle carrying charcoal that exploded in a busy market in north-east Nigeria, killing at least 20 people—has led to widespread concern, including in the capital, Abuja, and that is showing itself in public demonstrations. International pressure over the kidnapping of the girls from Chibok has forced the Nigerian Government to take notice and allow advisers from China, France, Israel, the UK and the US to assist its forces, but their presence is likely to be limited to assisting the search for the kidnapped girls, and will not include a general role in improving the Nigerian military’s capacity, over and above what is already being done.

I was pleased to hear from my right hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) that President Goodluck Jonathan has announced a plan to co-ordinate international anti-terrorist capability in the fight against Boko Haram and al-Qaeda-linked groups. That is precisely what our Committee has asked for—not just in Nigeria, but in the whole north-west Africa region. I add my support to my right hon. Friend’s request that the UK Government support the initiative.