Lt Col Umar Sanda Ahmed (rtd)
The submission of an Islamic cleric and a former Chief Imam of the Ghana Armed Forces on the subject of extremism last Sunday during a lecture organised by the Hijra Club is a trove of intelligence.
Elsewhere in this edition, Lt Col Umar Sanda Ahmed (rtd) takes us into a journey of Islamic history which explains clearly how a departure from the scriptures has led to jihadist extremism, as we exemplified by the Boko Harams, ISIS and others.
How can Islam which stands for peace and tolerance be compatible with forced marriage of young girls to jihadist leaders and murder of those who belong to other faiths?
In our case as a country, while we are vulnerable to the jihadist threat because of our proximity to countries encountering the deadly operations of the non-conformists, such revelations as contained in the lecture are worth pondering over by our national security managers.
There is no over-flogging a subject which borders on our national security, which is why we deem it worthy of commentary. This subject is not new on the public domain having been discussed by especially persons with security backgrounds many times, but when fresh insights such as prompted this commentary are provided, ignoring them cannot be a wise option.
That the movements of arms and ammunitions through such places as Allah Bar in the commercial part of Kumasi and Agblogbloshie in Accra is a reality as contained in his submission is a matter which our security agents must take seriously.
The underground world of gunrunning is so complex that bits of intelligence as contained in the lecture should not be dismissed as of no significance.
We pray that the jihadists who think that they understand the Islamic faith more than others do not extend their sphere to our part of the sub-region even as we pray that those encountering them are eventually freed of them.
Late last week, the fatal attack on some Burkinabes by the jihadists in the northern part of the country made the headlines and for security observers that is something which should prick our attention once more.
The cross border trade between people belonging to the same ethnic stock as it occurs on daily basis along our frontier markets makes it rather challenging if not impossible to check the movement of persons with extremist interpretation of the Islamic scriptures.
In a world reeling from a biting economic challenge, the anti-establishment rhetoric of clerics straddling the sub-region turns attractive to the disheartened; providing the fodder for an explosion.
It is for this reason that one of the recommendations of Imam Sanda that an early warning system be established alongside monitoring of persons who preach in our mosques be considered makes security sense.
The implementation of the foregone to complement the encouragement by the national security apparatus to citizens to report suspicious persons and occurrences to the authorities should not be overlooked.