Panacea to incessant violent conflicts By Tom Idoko

 

It is an absolute truism that the use of war, terrorism and other modes of violent conflicts to achieve political, economic, social, religious and ethnic interests, to influence and control the actions and behavior of governments in a way different from its original policy intents has occupied a wider space in the new world order of globalization. Nigeria has witnessed several conflicts since she gain independence in 1960. The first insurgency in Nigeria dates back to the military regime in 1966 when Major Isaac Adaka Boro led the Niger Delta Volunteer Force, an armed group to declare Niger Delta Republic. The Republic lasted for only 12 days before the federal forces crushed the insurgency and arrested Boro. A year later, Nigeria went through civil war in 30 turbulent months, and has grappled with various ethnic militias and ethno-religious and communal conflicts since the end of the civil war.
After the Shari’a crises that led to loss of lives and wanton destruction of properties, the Boko Haram terrorist groups raised their ugly heads and became a thorn on the flesh of the country. When Boko Haram struck Nigeria like a sudden, unexpected tsunami, it caught the country napping and unprepared. Kudos must be given to the change agenda of President Muhammadu Buhari, who quickly took the bull by the horns and pushed the terrorists away from the areas they occupied before his assumption of office in 2015.
Clashes between herders and crop farmers have been a major cause of increasing violence and general insecurity in Nigeria in recent times. Frequent clashes between the two agricultural occupational groups have since assumed very dangerous dimensions with unimaginable consequences for the continued coexistence of the country. In most of these encounters, citizens are killed and properties destroyed, which leaves the populace even poorer. According to the report of the Mercy corps, decades of violent conflicts in the Middle Belt region of Nigeria between farmers and herdsmen has devastated local communities, drastically reducing both security and economic activities. This global humanitarian organization funded by British Department of International Development (DFID) carried out a research between 2013 and 2016 on the causes and effects of the conflicts between the two groups, and found that the conflicts have caused loss of $14 billion in three years. The study on the effects of the conflicts also found that Nigeria stand to gain $13.7 billion annually in total macroeconomic progress in a scenario of peace between farmers and herders in Benue, Kaduna, Nasarawa and Plateau states alone.
In a country that boosts Africa’s largest economy, these resource based conflicts have impeded market development and economic growth by destroying assets, preventing trade, deterring investments, and eroding trust between market actors. The conflicts also take an enormous toll on the economic, health of families and households, in addition to the obvious and incalculable loss of human lives.
It is against this backdrop that the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR), a federal government agency that primarily focuses on peace building and conflict management in Nigeria and African continent, conceptualized the noble idea of Infrastructure for Peace (I4P) in Nigeria. The idea is to have a comprehensive and over-arching design framework for understanding, describing and implementing the various components of peace infrastructure. The Infrastructure for Peace in Nigeria include, early warning and early response, peace building, conflict management, capacity building, mediation, post conflict peace building and reconstruction. As Professor Oshita Oshita, the Director General of IPCR clearly asserted at the planning meeting for strategic stakeholders, “IPCR is adopting a strategy that brings the key actors in the governance chain together in building the structures for peace building, conflict prevention, management and resolution in Nigeria”. What this implies is that the idea of the Infrastructure for Peace in Nigeria could be the panacea to the perennial ethno-religious and other resource based conflicts in Nigeria.
The Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR), conducted the first Strategic Conflict Assessment (SCA) Zonal Consolidated Reports in 2003, and updated in 2008 and 2012. In view of the changing conflict dynamics in Nigeria, the 2016 SCA is accompanied by a National Action Plan, which emphasis multi-actor partnerships or synergies for peace building and conflict resolution in Nigeria. The 2016 Strategic Conflict Assessment (SCA) also contains field data and analysis, including conflict prevention and management strategies for government, institutions and communities.
We, Nigerians, development partners and other critical stakeholders should as a matter of priority, key into the change agenda PMB administration and support the Institute for Peace and Conflict resolution (IPCR), for lasting peace and socio-economic development of Nigeria. No nation develops in an atmosphere of violence. Thomas Hobbes was right when he said “the first fundamental law of nature is to seek peace and follow it”.

Idoko writes from Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR),
Abuja

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