In recent months, each week has brought reports of a new atrocity by the Nigerian militant group, Boko Haram. The latest incident was a suicide bombing in north-eastern Nigeria on Sunday, carried out by a girl thought to be as young as seven. Bombings by children are the latest innovation in cruelty by a group which has terrorised local populations with kidnappings, attacks on schools, and wide-scale killings since 2009.
The attack, which killed five and injured many more, highlights the security challenges facing Nigeria as it gears up to parliamentary and presidential elections on 28 March. Voting was initially scheduled for 14 February, but was delayed for six weeks to give Nigeria’s military time to secure the country. It is an optimistic timetable given that the military has not managed to contain Boko Haram in the six years that have passed since the group announced its war on the state. (For some background on Boko Haram’s origins and what it stands for, see this summary).
In an interview with Nigerian newspaper ThisDay published over the weekend, President Goodluck Jonathan conceded that his government had underestimated the group. “Probably at the beginning, we, and I mean myself and the team, we underrated the capacity of Boko Haram,” he said. He promised that Boko Haram’s defeat was imminent, adding that the military had recently acquired more arms and ammunition. Jonathan is seeking to be re-elected, standing against former military leader Mohammadu Buhari, who is broadly seen as more authoritative and less corrupt. It is the most closely contested election since the end of military rule in 1999.
Boko Haram controls significant territory in the north-east and has recently expanded its reach, carrying out cross-border raids on villages and military bases in neighbouring Chad, Cameroon, and Niger. It seems unlikely that the tide will turn decisively in favour of the authorities in just six weeks, although the hope in government is that even short-term gains will be enough to inch it towards re-election.
There are numerous explanations for Nigeria’s failure to deal with the group thus far. First of all is the fact that the areas where Boko Haram is strongest are traditionally poverty-ridden Muslim areas which are disconnected from Nigeria’s central government. These neglected regions have long been disenfranchised, which is why some initially supported the Islamist group as a viable alternative to a corrupt state that ignored the needs of local populations. That has broadly shifted over time with the kidnap of hundreds of children, the death of thousands of people, and the compulsory conscription of villagers as Boko Haram fighters. These isolated north-eastern provinces are a low priority for the government, despite the fact that this insurgency has affected an estimated three million people. This was illustrated by Jonathan’s slow response to the kidnapping of 200 schoolgirls last year.
Another issue is practical: the Nigerian army is underfunded, undertrained, and underequipped. The corruption that plagues the Nigerian state has undermined its military capability, as there has been poor investment in training and equipment. A case in point was last month, when Boko Haram attacked the village of Baga in Borno State: the Nigerian army was quickly outgunned. The village became the site of the worst massacre seen during the insurgency. It also gave Boko Haram control of Borno’s entire border area. (The Nigerian army announced this week that it had retaken control of Baga).
Now that the threat has spilled beyond Nigeria’s borders, a regional force made up of soldiers from Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon, and Niger has been formed. The delay in the election is ostensibly to give this group time to contain the threat of Boko Haram; but cynics suggest that it could just be a ploy to give the government more time to regroup its campaign. Writing in the Guardian, the Nigerian novelist Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani pointed out that this election will be “the first in Nigeria to be conducted with the spectre of Boko Haram in the background”. Jonathan’s opponents argue that he is uncaring about the suffering of people in the north. Yet conspiracy theories abound; supporters of Jonathan claim that Boko Haram has been manufactured to undermine the government.
With growing reach and evidence of increasing links to international jihadist movements like Al-Qaeda, Boko Haram poses a significant risk. People in Nigeria and the wider region are hoping that the election will bring a change that can see the threat contained, rather than a cynical reliance on old sectarian divisions between Christian and Muslim, south and north.