In Mozambique, an armed militia linked to the IS terrorist organisation is reigning and unleashing terror on innocent locals.
With tens of thousands of people killed, many more are running out of harm’s way; staying alive but definitely living in two precarious conditions: rage and fear.
The terrorists still lurk around to pick as many as they can find, and convert them to mean, daredevil terrorists. The fleeing weak in the process become radicalised and live in the danger of committing their lives to bloodshed.
In the last one year, the number of people fleeing their homes in Mozambique has risen to 700,000 from 70,000. The chances of seeing a Mozambican in harm’s way or inflicting harm on others has increased ten-fold.
The story doesn’t differ much across the continent. There are over 30million Africans displaced across the continent. Many African states are unsettled and are shaken by the activities of terrorists.
In the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, a rebel group known as the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) has reigned supreme since the ’90s. Now recognised as a subsidiary of the I.S, ADF has killed more than 200 people and displaced 40,000 since January according to the UN.
The UN Refugee Agency says the group, since 2017, has killed more than 1200 persons in the Beni area of the Ituri region, in eastern DRC. The dangers of letting this fester comes at a steep cost. The UN now says it needs $33m to resettle the displaced persons in the region.
In Ethiopia, where Northern Tigray came under the siege of government forces, many people have been left homeless and it is only hoped that the offshoots of that period of unrest won’t come back to bite the country in the butt. The East African giant needs quick action to bring its displaced citizens back home and avoid the establishment of rebel groups.
The thousands displaced today may see their strength as formidable enough to form groups that will give the government a run for its money. Bigger organisations are always lurking to recruit the next group of terror-happy daredevil and hopeless, innocent young men may become radicalised in the process.
The dangers of the existence of this radicalism lie both in the difficulty and the necessity of survival. African governments must fight terrorism and war headlong and avoid at all cost, the displacement of its people.
In Nigeria where terrorists have become money-starved, strategy has since changed to kidnapping, abducted individuals also risk being radicalised and initiated into dangerous organisations. This may come a last resort if their kidnap-for-ransome methods become fallible.
Many other nations risk similar fate with the next security upheaval just lurking. National governments must do more to protect their people, educate them and secure their future. It is the least citizens can be given.