Goingby the Gospel accounts, Jesus Christ was a pacifist par excellence. His teaching on turning the other cheek if slapped on one seems laughable and unrealistic. But there is no doubt that His advice on going an extra mile with your tormentors is germane particularly if that is necessary for your eventual victory, liberation, or peace of mind.The extremist Islamic sect, Boko Haram, continues to kill individuals, security agents, attacking police stations, and innocent communities in the Northern parts of the country. Yet, the government continues to put on a bold face, because it has more than enough money to compensate bereaved families, and invite world powers, the USA, the UK, and France to come to its aid. Where did the Federal Government get the N10b for security gadgets' It is always having money for things that have no direct bearing on the high standard of living of ordinary Nigerians. The N10b will go to countries that produce the gadgets who are the patrons of our rulers, creating problems for us so that they can sell their products and services to us.What happened to the peace initiative by Mrs. Sarah Jubril' That effort was going-on impressively and was full of hope. But the woman kept saying she was not mandated by the government. Unfortunately, nobody called President Goodluck Jonathans attention to it, or probably he preferred to lay his hope in his world power friends. I advise that Jubril be appointed to resume her interaction with the Boko Haram and that we adopt a pacifist approach. Towards resolving this challenge having failed to crush the sect with military might.In that spirit, we should stop talking about impunity, revenge, or retaliation. A pacifist who will go an extra mile with his or her tormentor will not mind releasing all the captured Boko Haram members if only to stop further damage. I had warned that hardly any of the countries, including the USA, win a war of attrition (Afghanistan, Somalia, and Iraq referred). Do you know that England never won against the Irish Republican Army for very many years by merely assembling security gadgets until the two warring factions became fed up and came before a dialogue table' Yet, the IRA represented only the Irish Catholic community (versus the almighty England!).Thus, the Federal Government should stop toying with our lives and property. It should enter into dialogue with the Boko Haram sect before it is too late. The sect had said releasing its captured men is a precondition; please release them. Human and material resources that are getting lost in the war against the Boko Haram should stop. I urge Nigerians to support whatever peace initiative that will bring peace to our land. Above all, we should change our perception of impunity in respect of the Boko Haram. Our religious and political leaders created the Boko Haram people, because they are tying religious institutions with the political ones ab initio, and whoever protested against that was deemed a kafir.Now, we are all paying the price as Christians, Muslims, infidels, apostates, atheists, and what have you. Unfortunately, there is no sign of repentance in our religio-political leaders who are hellbent on spending public funds on pilgrimages and building of churches and mosques. As if that impropriety was not enough, the government is putting billions of naira in security gadgets. At the end of the day, the country incurs heavy debts, and ordinary Nigerians are exploited further in the name of many things, including petroleum subsidy. Stop misgovernance, and lets sue for peace with the Boko Haram! The group is capable of destroying or circumventing our multi-billion naira gadgets, based on historical experience and the damage that the Boko Haram sect has been able to do so far.Pius Oyeniran Abioje, Ph. D, University of Ilorin.
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