Beyond the Battlefields, Non-Militarized Approach and Management of Armed Conflict in Nigeria: Takeaways from Operation Safe Corridor

Against the backdrop of Nigeria's troubled history with implementing nonmilitary strategies to counter armed groups, the study conducted a qualitative comparative analysis (QCA), and builds on the submissions of religious terrorist theorists to examine the prospects and challenges of Operation Safe Corridor (OSC). OSC is a home-grown prison-ased deradicalization program for lowrisk Boko Haram combatants. It represents a shift from pre-existing counterinsurgency frameworks that rely solely on military aggression. The logic behind the program derives from the need to afford a pathway for prospective defectors to undergo deradicalization. The program combines religious reorientation, counseling, capacity building, and payment of stipends at the point of recivilization. Compared to the Presidential Amnesty Program and those before it, the workings of the OSC remain shrouded in utmost secrecy. Besides claims by the National Security Adviser of the program's success in reintegrating thousands of ex-combatants, very little has been made public about the workings of the program. Furthermore, there is no verifiable evidence to suggest the OSC program have been able to entice Boko Haram combatants to defect. If anything, it has met stiff opposition from parliamentarians and social critics alike, who view the program as yet another prebend for patronal redistribution of billions of US dollars in military allocations. The paper concludes that for Nigeria's prison program to meet its predetermined objective of complementing the efforts of the military and providing an exit route for active combatants, it is imperative to reorient and better equip program officials, given the military's lack of prior experience with deradicalization. In addition, avenues for monitoring and evaluation must be created, given the huge financial cost of the program.