International Crisis Group
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In the latest Global Development Podcast from The Guardian, EJ Hogendoorn, Crisis Group’s Africa deputy program director, argues that a lack of effective governance in northern Nigeria combined with entrenched corruption and a lack of opportunities for the large youth population have created a fertile environment for Boko Haram.
FULL PODCAST (via The Guardian)
Photo: Global Panorama/ Flickr
Source: The Guardian
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Splintered Nigeria needs a shared vision | Nnamdi Obasi
As President Muhammadu Buhari assumes office this week, he takes the reins of a country in serious distress. Security poses a towering challenge, the economy is in dire straits, and corruption and impunity are rife.
Buhari, who won the election on the promise of change must now make good on that promise and start by rallying Nigerians around what they have lost: a common vision for the future.
FULL ARTICLE (via Mail & Guardian)
Photo: Nigeria News/ Flickr
Source: Mail & Guardian
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One Year Later, Hopes Fade for Girls Kidnapped by Boko Haram | Daniel Magnowski, Michael Olukayode and Elisha Bala-Gbogbo
A year after his daughters Amina and Zainab were kidnapped by Boko Haram militants with more than 200 other girls from their school dormitories in the Nigerian town of Chibok, Yakubu Maina fears he may never see them again.
“Sometimes I cannot but think my daughters have been killed,” Maina, a 50-year-old farmer, said by phone from Chibok. “Who knows if the girls are even still alive?”
FULL ARTICLE (via Bloomberg)
Photo: Michael Fleshman/Flickr
Source: Bloomberg
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Managing Nigeria’s Election Tensions | Nnamdi Obasi
Nnamdi Obasi, Senior Analyst, Nigeria, discusses possible outcomes of the general elections rescheduled for 28 March and 11 April, and how the international community should prepare for post-election unrest that looks increasingly likely.
Crisis Group: What impact has postponing these elections from February had on Nigeria?
Nnamdi Obasi: The decision by the government to delay the vote due on 14 February has had both positive and negative impacts.
The extra preparation time enabled the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deliver more permanent voter cards (PVCs) and to test the new PVC readers that will be used to check voter cards. As of 16 March, 56 million voters had collected their PVCs (81 per cent of the total 68.8 million registered voters), up from the 45.1 million (66 per cent) who had collected their cards before the announcement of postponement.
FULL INTERVIEW (via In Pursuit of Peace)
Photo: A poster of Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan ® is displayed side by side with opposition leader Muhammadu Buhari, Lagos, Nigeria, 14 January 2015. AFP
Source: In Pursuit of Peace
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CrisisWatch N°140
March saw significant improvements in resolving longstanding conflicts, particularly in Myanmar and Colombia. However, Yemen’s political crisis tipped into all-out war, and fighting increased again in South Sudan following suspension of the peace talks. In Africa, election-related tensions worsened ahead of Burundi’s June presidential elections, while renewed international support to Guinea-Bissau gave a lift to political stability and reform. In a significant development for West Africa and beyond, Nigeria witnessed, for the first time in its history, the ousting of a ruling party through national elections, with Muhammadu Buhari’s victory in the 28 March presidential elections.
FULL BRIEFING (via Crisis Group)
Source: Crisis Group
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Boko Haram ‘getting weaker every day’, says Nigeria president | AFP
The Nigerian president has said the military hopes to recapture towns seized by Boko Haram within a month, in what would be a swift victory after six years of bloody conflict.
But experts warned against any premature declaration of victory, with the militants still proving capable of carrying out deadly hit-and-run strikes and indications of coalition lapses.
Goodluck Jonathan, who is seeking re-election on 28 March, said Boko Haram was “getting weaker and weaker every day”. he told the BBC: “I’m very hopeful that it will not take us more than a month to recover old territories that hitherto have been in their hands.”
FULL ARTICLE (via The Guardian)
Photo: Cabinet Office/Flickr
Source: The Guardian
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Boko Haram Turns RobinHood’s Strategy on Its Head | Siobhán O’Grady
As a convoy of trucks carrying smoked fish cruised along the border of Niger and Nigeria last week, a Nigerien Air Force plane swooped low and opened fire, destroying the trucks and forcing the drivers to flee into Nigeria on foot.
The ill-fated fishmongers, Nigerien officials said, were collaborating with Boko Haram to sell their goods in Nigeria, despite Niger’s recent ban on cross-border fish trades. (Residents of Niger are called Nigerien; those from Nigeria are known as Nigerian). According to the Nigerien government, Boko Haram taxes goods transported through the territory the group controls to add to its cash reserves and finance terrorism, and the recent ban is intended to choke the Islamist group’s resources.
This alleged collaboration between rural fish traders and members of Boko Haram sheds some light on the group’s murky funding tactics, which differ sharply from those of other terrorist groups.
FULL ARTICLE (via Foreign Policy)
Photo: Hello World Media/flickr
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Tackle early the conditions that breed extremism | Jean-Marie Guéhenno (Crisis Group President and CEO)
The recent murders of Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto are tragic illustrations of the global reach of violent religious extremism.
The violence carried out by the Islamic State is particularly horrific, and a bitter first-hand experience for Japan. But it is part of a broader trend of extremist groups operating in deeply unstable pockets of the world and employing brutal tactics, including Boko Haram in Nigeria, Al-Shabaab in Somalia, the Pakistani Taliban, among others.
Closer to home, Islamic militants have attempted to blast their way on to the agenda in countries like Indonesia, the Philippines and India: all countries where Japan has sizable investments. They have had little success selling their ideology within these countries on any scale, but they remain a threat.
FULL COMMENTARY (via Nikkei Asian Review)
Photo: World Economic Forum/flickr
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Nigeria’s faltering response emboldens Boko Haram | Nnamdi Obasi (Crisis Group’s Senior Analyst for Nigeria)
On Jan. 25 the Nigerian armed group Boko Haram launched a major offensive on Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state, and two other towns. The attack, which left more than 200 combatants dead, was repulsed by the Nigerian military, but it shook the security of the government and people of Borno.
“This is the most serious attack yet,” Kashim Shettima, the governor of Borno, told reporters. “We faced a really existential threat.”
The attack on Maiduguri, the second since December 2013, underscores the grave challenge that Boko Haram poses to Nigeria and the country’s weak and slow response to this threat. The Nigerian government needs to review its faltering counterstrategy and strengthen the political, military and diplomatic elements crucial to reversing this dangerous tide.
FULL COMMENTARY (via Al Jazeera America)
Photo: Jordi Bernabeu Farrús/flickr
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Fear of the unknown: Trying to unlock the mystery of Boko Haram | Genna Buck
For five years, people in northeastern Nigeria have lived in fear of Boko Haram, the Islamist group whose name is synonymous with horror and mayhem. In January, the nightmare came true for residents of the town of Baga. Boko Haram fighters descended on Baga on Jan. 3, seizing a multinational military base and turning their wrath onto civilians. For four days, they shot people at random, fired rocket-propelled grenades and set fire to everything in sight.
The United Nations says 13,000 people escaped into neighbouring Chad. Satellite photos show Baga and nearby Doron Baga obliterated; an estimated 3,720 structures were damaged or destroyed. Some reports put the death toll as high as 2,000, which, if confirmed, would make this Boko Haram’s deadliest attack ever. “We believe hundreds of civilians were killed. We haven’t given a precise figure. There’s no one to count or even bury the dead,” says Daniel Eyre, Nigeria researcher at Amnesty International.
Nigeria’s government and military, widely supported in the Christian-dominated south of the country, have tried to repress information about the territory of which they have lost control in the majority-Muslim north. National elections are looming on Feb. 14. Making matters worse, Boko Haram has reportedly been disabling cellphone towers. “Baga is very remote, and getting reports about what’s going on there has been challenging, even for local media,” says Yinka Ibukun, a Nigerian freelance journalist based in Lagos.
FULL ARTICLE (Maclean’s)
Photo: European Commission DG ECHO/flickr