Boko Haram related terror deaths are on a downward plunge. The United States coordinated terror-death tracker, the Nigeria Security Tracker (NST) has been recording terror-related deaths since the inception of the Goodluck Jonathan administration.
Goodluck Ebele Jonathan of the PDP party in Nigeria came into office as president in May of 2010. His reign which lasted till May of 2015 was marked with 40,000 terror related newspaper reported deaths, mostly from Boko Haram terror and military counter terror actions and also from increased sectarian terror events.
Nigeria Security Tracker (NST), a project of the Council on Foreign Relations’ Africa program is the only public viewable project that monitors deaths reported in Nigerian dailies.
It is important to note that the deaths are grossly under reported even in the NST, this is because the NST only counts deaths reported in Nigerian dailies which are very incomplete and through the reign of Boko Haram terror were unable to penetrate thousands of acres of Nigerian territory under command of Boko Haram. Estimates put the true figure of Boko Haram terror deaths at hundreds of thousands to over a million. Several mass graves have been discovered in recaptured territories. Boko Haram was on a well financed mission to claim the resource-rich land of the northeast without its people.
Boko Haram has in addition to the over 40,000 deaths, in its pogrom targeting farmers in the nation’s resource-rich northeast, managed the displacement of over 3 million Nigerians, the second highest displacement in the world today with 1.4 million children reported displaced according to latest records.
Trade routes are being re-established, schools are reopening and life is slowly returning to the years-ravaged northeast.
What is largely left in the successful war, that Nigerians ask for, is for the Buhari government to unveil the sponsors of Boko Haram and bring them to book. Nigerians are confident that as fast as democratic systems permit, the new energized Department of State Security, DSS and larger National security department will soon finally let the world know who has been behind Boko Haram and why.
After six hopeless years, there seems to finally be hope for a nation desperate for peace, security and the semblance of order.
Dr. Peregrino Brimah; http://ENDS.ng [Every Nigerian Do Something] Email: drbrimah@ends.ng Twitter: @EveryNigerian