Nigeria: State Malfunction, Jihadist Terror

"He [Abubakar Shekau] relishes in this spotlight because he continues to show up on videos and taunt Barack Obama and other world leaders and Nigerian leaders and Islamic leaders. He knows that the media around the world is portraying him this way, but it gives him a further pulpit or platform to convey his message in a paradoxical way."
Jacob Zenn, analyst, African and Eurasian affairs, Jamestown Foundation

"The group's upper leaders are driven by the desire to turn Nigeria into a theocratic state. But the foot soldiers are simply conscripts from poor and destitute families."
Shehu Sani, civil rights activist, Nigeria

"He comes across as completely insane, and that accentuates the risk. You cannot predict his behaviour. He is just a sadist out to kill."
Lawan Abana, relative of a kidnapped schoolgirl

Women attend a demonstration calling on government to rescue the kidnapped school girls.
AP Photo/ Sunday Alamba

 

Boko Haram has killed about four thousand people in the past five years, since it began its Islamist rampage through northeast Nigeria. About a half-million people have been forced to flee their homes, leaving behind ghost towns across the country's arid north. In Abuja, the capital, and in the megalopolis of Lagos, car bombs have become common. The country of 170 million representing Africa's most populous nation has oil riches, but little trickles down to those living in poverty.

Nigeria is the world's eighth-largest oil producer. It remains desperately poor, particularly the Muslim-dominated north, where 70 percent of its people live on an income of less than a dollar a day, a half century after achieving independence from the United Kingdom. A cleric named Mohammed Yusuf formed Boko Haram in Maiduguri, Borno, in late 1990, gaining a devoted following as he tried to impose Sharia law and to ban all secular education.

The government of Nigeria took notice when some of Boko Haram's followers took up arms. A battle that took place in 2009 in Maiduguri cost 600 lives as the security forces tore down the group's mosque, detaining hundreds of supporters. Yusuf who was taken into custody died there, in a clear attempt to destroy the movement, through the execution of its leader. Survivors fled to Chad, Mali and Niger. Where al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb stepped in to give them military training.

Under its current leader, Boko Haram bought weapons that flooded the Sahara after the civil war in Libya released all manner of arms to the area and beyond. Enabling them to mount continual hit-and-runs on Nigeria's military, itself ill-equipped and -trained. Classroom massacres took place forcing the closure of hundreds of schools across the region. The Chibok school where close to 300 girls were abducted was only temporarily opened for exams.

An unidentified mother cries out during a demonstration with others who have daughters among the kidnapped school girls. 
AP Photo/ Gbemiga Olamikan

 

Shekau behaves like a messianic leader speaking directly to God. Recruits are mostly "rowdy, unemployed, African youth who are looking for a target for their grievances", according to Bronwyn Bruton, African expert at the Atlantic Council. The kidnapped schoolgirls will in all likelihood be kept as "sex slaves" to cook, clean and perform household chores. Some will be sold in Cameroon and Chad. Shekau invokes jihadi tradition in Islam approving women captured in war as slaves their "masters" can use as they will.

The group funds its operations by robbing banks, convoys and businesses according to World Policy Institute, a New York-based think tank. Boko Haram steals guns and explosives from police armouries. Some northern state governors and political parties enable their activities through payoffs. There are also large ransoms paid by governments to free European hostages.

Residents of Nigeria are divided into over 250 ethnic groups speaking English, Hausa, Youba, Igbo, Fulani and a staggering 500 indigenous languages. While the south, which is largely Christian, benefits from oil resources making it the leading economic country in Africa, the more sparsely populated, impoverished north is deteriorating into terror and violence. The army has been unable to stop the attacks in northern Nigeria despite instituting a state of emergency.

About 20% of its budget ($5.9-billion) is spent on security, a small portion of which is used to fight terrorism. The country's soldiers are underpaid and would prefer to absent themselves. They are also suspected of colluding with the terrorists. When they do intervene, locals are alienated by their clumsy handling of situations and their heavy-handedness.

Soldiers terrorize residents, rounding up innocent young men in random sweeps, who are never again heard from.