Evidence of meeting #36 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was persecution.
A recording is available from Parliament.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Currently, are there other groups persecuting children, or is it just Boko Haram?
Special Counsel, Jubilee Campaign
Well, Boko Haram is the main terrorist group. There's a subgroup called Ansaru, and they specialize in targeting westerners. Ansaru has killed Britons, Germans, Italians, people from about 15 different nationalities.
The persecution of children, however, is also done by state governments in the north. If you are a Christian child and you go to a public school, they will try to force you to study Islamic studies, and if you don't, you are punished. I refer to several layers of persecution, and we do have that certainly happening, even in the educational system in northern Nigeria.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
Thank you. That's all the time we have.
We'll continue with Mr. Anderson, for seven minutes, please.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
I want to thank our witnesses for being with us today.
Saa, I would like to know what your community was like before this. Did you and your family feel threatened before this, or was this something completely new for your area?
Jubilee Campaign
Well, it happened before, because I was in another school before, in Bama, and the Boko Haram attacked the school before I went back to Chibok. We didn't even know that would happen because we were in school and our gate was closed. We had security that was guarding us, but by the time this happened nobody came to talk to us and nobody came to help us, and nobody came to tell us where to go. Even our teachers—we were together—ran away. They didn't even come to talk to us. We didn't know why this happened to us. Over 200 girls are still in captivity and have been for several months now, and we don't know what is happening with them. Some of their parents have even died. No action has been taken and we don't know what is happening to them now.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Thank you.
Emmanuel, can you tell us a little bit more about the security situation there? I'm just wondering, how does Boko Haram operate in that area? Are they small groups of people who are moving in and out of an area so it's very difficult to locate them? How much support are they getting from local governments? How much structure do they have? How does the government effectively deal with this?
Special Counsel, Jubilee Campaign
Thank you very much, Mr. Anderson.
I literally just returned from Nigeria last week, and the refugee situation is worse than anything I've seen in years. What has happened is that Boko Haram has captured more than 30 cities. One of them, the largest they captured, is a city of 300,000 people, which about 500 terrorists were able to overrun.
Those kinds of losses are not sustainable. This is exactly what happened in northern Mali when the city of Gao was captured by 1,000 terrorists and the French went in to roll them back because there were 6,000 French citizens' lives at stake.
Sadly, although we've reached the same milestone in northern Nigeria with the fall of Mubi, the French are not coming in to help, because that is not a francophone country. The Brits are also not coming in. We have a really horrific security situation in which these entire cities are taken and we do not hear anything about the people who are inside.
I can tell you about a few of the girls in our program. While I was in Nigeria last week, one of them found out that her uncle and her cousins had been killed. When I came back, this week one of them found out that her brother had been killed. These are people in our girl education program right now. If we hadn't taken them out, they would have been killed as well.
Mr. Anderson, the security situation is very bad. The Nigerian military is not as effective as it should be. We are losing territory, and I think about nine counties have fallen to the terrorists as we speak.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
I can go in a number of directions with that, but I guess I'd like to pursue this one a bit. What role does a military solution play here? Coming back to what Mr. Dewar asked you earlier, what role do moderate Muslims play in the resolution of this? How able are they to speak out and to join in? As we heard on your video, if people speak out, they are targeted as well.
There are two things: what is the role of the military in this, and what role do moderate Muslims play in the solutions?
November 25th, 2014 / 9:25 a.m.
Special Counsel, Jubilee Campaign
As far as the military role is concerned, I think that Nigeria has a large enough army that, if it is properly equipped and properly supported, it can do most of its [Technical Difficulty—Editor].
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
We are having a hard time here. You are breaking up a little bit.
Conservative
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Mr. Chair, I have two or three minutes left, but I'm wondering—
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Well, we lost that, but anyway, Peter Goldring has a question, I think, for our witnesses who are here.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Maybe he can deal with that here while we're fixing the connection.
Conservative
Peter Goldring Conservative Edmonton East, AB
Thank you.
I'll pose a question to extend the comment by the witness on the interfaith dialogue. Is there any Muslim authority or leadership that can provide this type of dialogue within worldwide Muslim organizations, or is it something that should or could be established?
It seems to me that this is a question that comes up not only here—I'm not speaking just about Muslims—because we were very much aware of the Christian division before in Ireland. But with Muslims, is there anything worldwide that can foster this kind of interfaith dialogue and can be moderating to the Muslim community worldwide?
Chief Executive Officer, Voice of the Martyrs Canada
I guess I'll [Technical Difficulty—Editor]
I'm not sure I could give you a fair response. I don't know of anything specific that is structured the way you just described it, but I certainly know that there are people of good will. We like to think of ourselves as being in that category of people who would be more than willing to address that kind of dialogue. That being said, I don't specifically know of an organization or structure that —
Conservative
Peter Goldring Conservative Edmonton East, AB
Isn't that something that should be, because it seems to be relevant more than here in Nigeria. It seems to be dealing with, in this particular case, a lot of Muslim situations worldwide, that somehow it can be structured to have this kind of moderating consultation with the community. Most other Christian faiths, orthodox and that, have their ultimate higher consuls who can be approached, but with the Muslims it seems to be not so.
Chief Executive Officer, Voice of the Martyrs Canada
I think the overriding principle in my mind would need to be pursuit of religious freedom and the precepts or tenets of religious freedom, which I believe our office of religious freedom is ascribing to. There are moderate groups all over the world that are starting to take notice of the whole matter of religious freedom as being something that arises from human rights in general.
Conservative
Peter Goldring Conservative Edmonton East, AB
Is it not something that should be generated from within the Muslim community itself to be the overarching, could you say, consul to guide other Muslim communities in some form of moderation? Has this ever been approached? For us to presume to be this moderating authority outside the Muslim faith is a little bit high-handed, but if you could engage the Muslim faith itself in some way to provide this—