IN GOD

I will like to make a distinction between Islam and Islamism, just like there is a clear cut distinction between Christianity and Christian extremism, the latter symbolized by Timothy McVeigh and Anders Breivik of the Knights Templers.

Islam as we know is a religion with deep and abiding appeal while Islamism as defined by Daniel Pipes demands man’s complete adherence to the sacred law of Islam and rejects as much as possible outside influence with some exceptions (such as access to military and medical technology). It is imbued with a deep antagonism towards non Muslims and has a particular hostility towards the west (read Boko Haram). It amounts to an effort to turn Islam as a religion and civilization into an ideology. It is a total transformation of traditional Islam.

Islamism has been thriving in Africa in recent times especially in North, East and West Africa because it is tapping into ideological roots that were laid down long before now (the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt has a well cultivated pedigree that dates back to 1928) and kept alive by failure of governments, bankrolled by offshore financiers and inspired by the defiant (and highly successful) regime of revolutionary Iran. It is now a language of dissent winning because it is the deepest and widest channel into which today’s Arab discontent can flow. They have succeeded in taking over the governments in post Arab spring North Africa (Egypt and Tunisia) with Libya being the exception. This was probably what Hilary Clinton had in mind when she admitted in Egypt on the 13^th of July 2012 that “things changed at a kind of warped speed”.  

The success has not been so smooth or fast in West Africa, but nonetheless there have been concerted efforts to conquer these parts of the continent. As far back as 2008, elements of the Trans national Islamist group, Al Shabab, attempted infiltrating post election Kenya without success to cause dissent. To halt their continuing effort to gain foothold in its territory, Kenya had to invade Somalia (the operational base of Al Shabab) in October of 2011. The extent of their success in Kenya is debatable, but what is not in doubt is their resolve. Earlier this month, the twitterati of Kenya started blaming the Somalian refugees as culpable for a host of Kenya’s problems.

The story is different in the Islamic Maghreb (Mali, Mauritania and Niger). This area has gradually come to be the operational hub of the Islamists, and with hounding of Al Qaeda leadership in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen, Al Qaeda  in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is the new face of terror. Al Qaeda and Al Shabab merged in early 2012. The GUARDIAN of London in its 13^th of July edition listed Ansar Dine, Boko Haram and Mujao as the three major forces backed by AQIM. The same edition of the newspaper quoted a Mali based western diplomat as saying “If Islamists continue to control vast areas of Mali (equal in size to the whole of France) where they can do what they like, then this will pose a direct threat to Europe”.

The poverty, ignorance and frustration prevalent in the areas stretching from the peninsula in Somalia to Central and West Africa has made the area a veritable recruiting ground for frustrated people to rally around a single ideology not necessarily of their own making.

Boko Haram has derailed from the original path charted by its founder. This is no surprise as a revolutions’ consequences need not follow from its causes. The movement has allowed itself to be hijacked by Islamists who have a different agenda. The crusade they are being used for has been planned long before and they only provided the platform. There are powerful and influential people behind them and their activities are thriving here because of the support they have from within. If you have the chairman of a political party claiming they (Boko Haram) are fighting for “justice”, and the president of the nation admitting that they have permeated every strata of the society including his presidency, then you know we are not in normal times. This is the same country that was predicted to have been heading for “failure” some years back. It is the same country one of whose topmost bankers was imprisoned in the mid 90’s (after his sojourn in Sudan) for participating in religious extremism activities that led to death.

The Islamists in my opinion are just about 10% of the Muslims population worldwide, but they are very active and vocal with their reach and influence far greater than their numbers. There is a great battle going on for the soul of the Muslim world. This is the battle between the Khomeini and Atartuk dispositions. This is a battle that will make an ideology encourage its adherents to seek to eliminate members of other faiths. This is an ideology that seeks to desecrate the institution of an Emir/Shehu. This is an ideology that encourages the killings of Islamic scholars that do not toe its chosen path, an ideology that is attempting to embark on a modern day crusade.

The Islamists have suffered tremendous setbacks in the Middle East just as Boko Haram had been crushed in Nigeria in 2009 but what we are witnessing here now is a resurgent Al Qaeda reinventing itself in Africa and using Boko Haram amongst others as its vehicle for achieving its goal. It is not what it seems to be at the surface and certainly not a battle between Muslims and Christians but a more intricate and complex battle being supported and financed by extremely powerful, wealthy and influential forces from behind the scene.

Akpobaro Ebinum.

akposebinum@yahoo.com