Terrorism: Military force has failed; new approach needed – Ablakwa

The Ranking Member on parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has suggested new ways of dealing with terrorism across the globe including negotiations, as the use of military force has not yielded the desired results given more people are joining the ranks of terror organisations.

“Just using force and thinking that you can identify key ringleaders [to deal with them will not work]. Now terrorism has metamorphosed and become free for all. They are using new technology and ICT has come to complicate matters,” he argued on Class FM’s World Affairs programme on Friday July 21.

He said the reason why terrorism still exists is because we “appear to be doing the same thing and we want to expect different results”.

For him, “using the hardline approach will clearly not help and that is what they [terrorists] want”, adding: “So there is a need for a new paradigm for us to come to a certain consensus and I will go for a total change in international relations and politics,” he told host Dr Etse Sikanku.

“We have come this far and terrorism is thriving because of the old ways of wanting to use a military solution, wanting to use force and not really changing the sphere of international relations; how we have related to countries and pursued our interests and the people we have identified as enemies and how we will go after them no matter what, in the process we breed terrorism if we didn’t know that inadvertently that is what we are doing.”

The Member of Parliament (MP) for North Tongu said the actions of nations and some individuals seem to be breeding more terrorists, noting: “We are only providing fertile grounds for these terrorist organisations to recruit, regroup and continue to create justification and continue with their reign of terror.”