I Will Sponsor You, Spare My Life: The Chronicle of Boko Haram.

Today in Nigeria, there’s great unrest. Leaders set on each others throat yearning for blood, and worst, there’s a great level of violence, insecurity, incessant killing and bombing by Northern Islamic group who called themselves, Boko Haram. The confusion, misplaced priority, prepositions and misdirected blames trading around the country, is what am here to address, setting the record straight, laying blames where they lie and most importantly, giving you a brief but comprehensive account of the true genesis of Boko Haram.

The name was never Boko Haram, their intent, their original intent never was to kill people or destroy properties. Boko Haram started as an idea, a passionate idea of practicing the real teachings of Prophet Mohammed. This idea was pioneered by Mohammed Yusuf, the man who later became the group’s kingpin and who was killed in a police cell after his arrest in 2009. The idea was born in the early 90s, more precisely, in the year 1995. Mohammed Yusuf felt that things were not done the way Prophet Mohammed has laid it out in the Holy Quaran. And thus, he began a harmless crusade, convincing other muslim faithfuls to stand firm on the true teachings of Prophet Mohammed, never to compromise their faith no matter the odds. Like every great leader with quality plan, Mohammed Yusuf began his expansion program that affected no one, not even the government. He moved from one Northern state to another duplicating his teachings of obedience to Prophet Mohammed’s way of life.

At some point in his crusade, again like every other leader with great aspiration, he started asking people, his loyal followers, not to go to school. To see school as something that has come to take away from them, their true religion and way of life that Prophet Mohammed teaches. It was at this point that the government saw them as a big threat that MUST be stopped. Mohammed Yusuf challenged the authority with everything that he’s got and that led to his arrest and secret killing.

Killing the head of any group sparks up an even more greater passion for the persons ideas and concepts. When Mohammed Yusuf was killed, his followers installed another leader who altered the original plan. He came with a reprisal attack but only centered on security operatives and agencies. They were going to police stations and killing them in their numbers, planting and detonating explosives in police stations. It was at this stage that political elites and Northern elders felt that they have got a strong group that can withstand the government and fight them to a standstill. They bought into their program, sponsored and manipulated them again and again in various ways, using them to kill innocent people just for the government to be seen as reckless, careless, and incapable of protecting the people they took an oath to protect.

In the early stage of this usage, only Churches were targeted and bombed. Killings and maiming were heavily unleashed on the Christian faithfuls and the sound you here then from most Mosque is “Allah Huakbauru”, a joyous exclamation that means “God is great”. After a while, Abubakar Shekau began to understand that he and his group are being used by the Northern elders as well as politicians to do their biddings. That was the point when they turned the heat around, redirecting their target to face both the Northern elders as well as the Christians. They bombed both Church and Mosques.

Now the Northern elders saw that the group they once funded, protected and groomed have now grown out of their control, they tried to destroy them, but by then, it was already too late Abubakar Shekau had already changed the plan again. They went for the Emir of Kano, the recently deceased Emir, and lucky for him, he escaped it.

The hidden or not so hidden truth is that the remaining Northern leaders and politicians today, are the sponsors of the Boko Haram group. Most of them, from the very top to the bottom, fold their hands, sponsor them in secret and in return, their lives are spared by the groups. This is what is obtainable today, this is what we know, and this is the true situation of things in Nigeria right now. The government, are part of the cover up and this war, this attack, may never come to an end unless a drastic measure is taken, by the people of Nigeria.