Cells Of Boko Haram
10
The above cases were not isolated incidences. On 5th December 2013, a Saudi Arabian Boeing 747 cargo plane landed at the Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport, Abuja and developed a fault on the runway, which forced inbound flights to be diverted to neighbouring airports for hours. All accusing fingers pointed to the plane as carrying arms, but airport officials barbed the plane with strong security presence and an undignified silence. Time seems to have consumed the event.
If Nigerians weren't shockabsorbers, the most damning case of mercenary business would be the case of the trio of Lebanese decent, Mustapha Fauzi Fawaz, Abdallah Thahini and Talal Roda. In May, 2013, weapons of a military scale were discovered in an underground bunker-type cell in a house at No. 3 Gaya Road, Kano. The house and the weapons were all linked to the trio mentioned above. Mr Fauzi Fawaz is known to be the co-owner of Wonderland Amusement Park as well as Amigo Supermarket, both places of elitist taste in Abuja. Through its security agencies, Amigo Supermarket was sealed by the Nigerian government amidst tension, anger, apprehension and confusion in the ordinary citizens. The trio were arrested and, later, sent to court after some investigations. Officially, only Talal Roda was identified as a "Lebanese with Nigerian Passport".
Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano:
Do weapons get discharged here or pass through?
Then, politicians, lawyers, businessmen and diplomats all went into action, designing and re-designing, plotting and counter-plotting, ways of getting their own respective pounds of flesh on the matter. The first plot to surface came barely a month, in June 2013, after the arrest of the trio when the Amigo Supermarket owner, Mr Fauzi Fawaz, slammed a N50 million ($300,000) suit against the Nigerian government and its agencies involved in the weapons discovery and arrest of the suspects.
Inspecting arms found at No. 3 Gaya Road, Kano:
Hizbullah's or Boko Haram's?
Analysts say this was a delay tactics, by the trio, against their trial as well as an intimidation to provoke certain elements in government to invoke the process of negotiations. To a certain degree, this worked well for the trio. In November 2013, only Talal Roda was sentenced to life imprisonment, while the other two were discharged for want of prosecution evidence.
The government then linked the weapons to Hizbullah, a Lebanon-based military front, and announced Talal Roda as Hizbullah agent, from its findings. The government announced that the weapons were found to be meant used against Hizbullah targets in Nigeria. However, the government did not officially name any known Hizbullah target in Nigeria. Commonly, the only suspected Hizbullah target in Nigeria may be the Embassy of the State of Israel.
Some watchers of the Nigerian judicial system think that Talal Roda, himself, was only officially pronounced guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment, but he may not spend more than three months in prison as diplomatic spanners will come to work, "re-make his identity", and then smuggle him home to Lebanon. If this is true, then the plot of the trio has worked, mercenaries have gotten a longer span on their nefarious activities, and Boko Haram has won the day in continuing death and destruction.
Some analysts believe that the Nigerian security network is actually doing its job nicely, but it faces daunting challenges of "bad eggs within the network" as well as politicians and certain government officials, involved in criminal activities, who are administrative superiors to the security network personnel.
Curiously enough, all arms transportations that have come to public knowledge are either "destined for Malabu", "destined for Kinshasa" or "meant to be used by Hizbullah cells in Nigeria".