Boko Haram

1. Boko Haram

2. Foundation and Ideology • Islamist terrorist movement, founded in 2002, based in northeast Nigeria, also active in Chad, Niger and northern Cameroon. • Estimates of membership vary between a few hundred and 10,000 • Boko Haram was founded as a Sunni Islamic fundamentalist sect advocating a strict form of sharia law and developed into a Salafist-jihadi group in 2009, influenced by the Wahhabi movement. The movement is so diffuse that fighters associated with it do not necessarily follow Salafi doctrine. • BokoHaram seeks the establishment of an Islamic state in Nigeria. It opposes the Westernization of Nigerian society and the concentration of the wealth of the country among members of a small political elite, mainly in the Christian south of the country.

3. The early years • Mohammed Yusuf founded the sect that became known as Boko Haram in 2002 • He established a religious complex and school that attracted poor Muslim families from across Nigeria and neighboring countries. • The center had the political goal of creating an Islamic state, and became a recruiting ground for jihadis. • BokoHaram conducted its operations more or less peacefully during the first seven years of its existence, withdrawing from society into remote northeastern areas. • The government repeatedly ignored warnings about the increasingly militant character of the organization.

4. 2009- Boko Haram crushed? • In 2009 security forces arrested nine Boko Haram members and confiscated weapons and bomb-making equipment. • Revenge attacks on police and widespread rioting followed. A joint military task force operation was launched in response, and by the end of July more than 700 people had been killed, mostly Boko Haram members • Yusuf was arrested, and died in custody "while trying to escape". He was succeeded by Abubakar Shekau, formerly his second-in-command • Bornogovernment officials believed that the state deserved praise from the international community for ending the conflict in such a short time, and that the "wave of fundamentalism" had been "crushed“ • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnQ1tVIr8vk

5. Prison Break • In September 2010, BokoHaram broke 105 of its members out of prison in Maiduguri along with over 600 other prisoners and went on to launch attacks in several areas of northern Nigeria. • “About 50 men with machine guns came to the prison site, forced the prison open and released all the prisoners." • The attackers went cell by cell at the prison, breaking open locks and starting a fire before escaping during the confusion, according to Bauchi state police commissioner DanlamiYar'Adua. He said everything possible was being done to track down the escaped prisoners.

6. UN bombing • Under Shekau's leadership, the group continuously improved its operational capabilities. • It began launching IED attacks against soft targets, and its first vehicle-borne IED attack in June 2011, killing 6 at the Abuja police headquarters. • In August 2011, Boko Haram bombed the UN headquarters in Abuja.23 died in the suicide car bomb attack. • A spokesman claiming responsibility for the attack, warned of future planned attacks on U.S. and Nigerian government interests • The increased sophistication of the group led observers to speculate that Boko Haram was affiliated with AQIM, which was active in Niger. • http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/nigeria/8724468/Massive-bomb-blast-hits-UN-building-in-Nigeria.html

8. Election bombings and police shootings • Within hours of Goodluck Jonathan's presidential inauguration in May 2011, Boko Haram carried out a series of bombings • The most successful of these was the attack on the army barracks in Bauchi. • The president would announce that Boko Haram had in reality infiltrated both the army and the police, as well as the executive, parliamentary and legislative branches of government. • The group conducted several political and religious assassinations throughout 2011. • The common theme throughout the northeast was the targeting of police, who were regularly massacred at work or in drive-by shootings at their homes. • The election defeat of former military dictator MuhammaduBuhari increased religious political tension, as the presidency was expected to change hands to a northern, Muslim candidate. • Sectarian riots engulfed the twelve northern states of the country during the three days following the election, leaving more than 800 dead and 65,000 displaced. The subsequent campaign of violence by Boko Haram culminated in a string of bombings across the country on Christmas Day.

9. Escalation • As the government announced a state of emergency, violence continued to intensify. • The opening three weeks of 2012 accounted for more than half of the death total of the preceding year. • Two days after the state of emergency was declared, Boko Haram released an ultimatum to southern Nigerians living in the north, giving them three days to leave. • In Kano, on January 20th, they carried out by far their most deadly action yet, an assault on police buildings, killing 190. One of the victims was a TV reporter. The attacks included a combined use of car bombs, suicide bombers and IEDs, supported by uniformed gunmen • http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-16663693

10. Government and police are perpetrators too. • Credible reports indicate uniformed military personnel and paramilitary mobile police carried out summary executions, assaults, torture, and other abuses . • The national police, army, and other security forces committed extrajudicial killings and used lethal and excessive force to apprehend criminals and suspects, as well as to disperse protesters. Authorities generally did not hold police accountable for the use of excessive or deadly force or for the deaths of persons in custody. Security forces generally operated with impunity in the illegal apprehension, detention, and sometimes extrajudicial execution of criminal suspects. • Although the constitution and law prohibit such practices and provide for punishment of such abuses, torture is not criminalized.

11. Crossing the border • Since early 2013, Boko Haram have increasingly operated in Northern Cameroon, and have been involved in skirmishes along the borders of Chad and Niger. • In February 2013, Boko Haram was responsible for kidnapping seven French tourists in the far north of Cameroon. In November 2013, Boko Haram members kidnapped a French priest in Cameroon. In December 2013, Boko Haram gunmen reportedly attacked civilians in several areas of northern Cameroon. In 2013, the group also kidnapped eight French citizens in northern Cameroon and obtained ransom payments for their release.

12. The girls • In April 2014, Boko Haram kidnapped 276 girls from Chibok, Borno. More than 50 of them soon escaped, but the remainder have not been released. • Shekau, announced his intention of selling them into slavery. • The incident brought Boko Haram extended global media attention. • In October, the government announced the girls' imminent release, but the information proved unreliable. • The announcement to the media may have been a political ploy by the president to raise his popularity before his confirmation of his candidacy in the 2015 general election. • Earlier in the year, the girls' plight had featured on "#BringBackOurGirls" political campaign posters in the streets of the capital

14. Back to Cameroon • In 2014 Boko Haram continued to increase its presence in northern Cameroon. • In July, the vice-president's home village was attacked by around 200 militants; his wife was kidnapped. At least 15 people, including soldiers and police, were killed in the raid. The vice-president's wife was subsequently released in October, along with 26 others including the ten Chinese construction workers who had been captured in May • In a separate attack, nine bus passengers and a soldier were shot dead and the son of a local chief was kidnapped. Hundreds of local youths are suspected to have been recruited.

15. Losing land and spiraling out of control • 2014 signaled a change in strategy for Boko Haram, as the group began to capture territory in north-eastern and eastern areas of Borno, as well as in Adamawa and Yobe. • Shekauannounced that Gwoza was now part of an Islamic caliphate. • The military continued to deny Boko Haram's territorial gains, which were, however, confirmed by local vigilantes who had managed to escape. • In October of 2014, the Chief of the Defense Staff announced that a ceasefire had been brokered, stating "I have accordingly directed the service chiefs to ensure immediate compliance with this development in the field." • Within 48 hours, however, BokoHaram attacks had nevertheless continued unabated. • On October 29, Mubi, a town of 200,000 in Adamawa, fell to the militants, further undermining confidence in the peace talks. • As of November it was estimated that more than twenty towns and villages had been taken control of by the militants • On November 28, 120 died in an attack at the central mosque in Kano during Friday prayers. There were 27 Boko Haram attacks during the month of November, killing at least 786

16. Baga Massacre • On 3 January 2015, Boko Haram attacked Baga in NE Nigeria, seizing it and the military base used by a multinational force set up to fight them. The town was burned and the people massacred. • Although the death toll of the massacre was earlier estimated by local officials to be upwards of 2000, the Defense Ministry has now dismissed these claims as "speculation and conjecture" and "exaggerated". • They estimate the death toll to be closer to 150 instead. It should be noted, however, that this is an estimation and that Nigeria has often been accused of underestimating casualty figures in an effort to downplay the threat of Boko Haram.

17. ISIS • On 4 March 2015, Boko Haram's leader Abubakar Shekau pledged allegiance to ISIS via an audio message posted on the organizations twitter account • http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/07/africa/nigeria-boko-haram-isis/ • http://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2015/03/04/nr-magnay-boko-haram-beheading.cnn

18. Boko Haram in trouble • On 24 March 2015, residents of Damasak, Nigeria said that Boko Haram had taken more than 400 women and children from the town • On March 27, the Nigerian army captured Gwoza, which was believed to be the location of Boko Haram headquarters. • On election day, 28 March 2015, Boko Haram extremists killed 41 people, including a legislator, to discourage hundreds from voting. • In March 2015, Boko Haram lost control of the Northern Nigerian towns of Bamaand Gwoza to the Nigerian army. • The Nigerian authorities said that they had taken back 11 of the 14 districts previously controlled by BokoHaram. • In April, four Boko Haram camps in the Sambisa Forest were overrun by the Nigerian military who freed nearly 300 females.BokoHaram forces were believed to have retreated to the MandaraMountainsalong the Nigeria-Cameroon border

19. Mosque attacks • BokoHaram militants attacked multiple mosques between 1 and 2 July. • Forty-eight men and boys were killed on the 1st at one mosque. • Seventeen were wounded in the attack. Ninety-seven others, mostly men, were killed in numerous mosques on the 2nd with a number of women and young girls killed in their homes. An unknown number were wounded. • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YpyAmQ5tTY

20. Actions in Chad • On 15 June 2015, two suicide bombings of police sites in N'Djamena, the capital and largest city of Chad, killed 38 people. Boko Haram later claimed responsibility for these attacks. • On 11 July, a male suicide bomber disguised in a woman's Burqa detonated his explosives belt in the main market of N'Djamena, next to the main mosque, killing 15 people and injuring 80.Several days after the bombing, Boko Haram claimed responsibility via Twitter, signing as "Islamic State, West Africa province."

21. Nigeria says Boko Haram defeated • In December 2015 MuhammaduBuhari, the President of Nigeria, claimed that Boko Haram was "technically defeated.“ • This was said despite numerous attacks continuing throughout the region. • See articles

22. Split • In August 2016, Boko Haram split into two factions after long-time leader AbubakarShekau rejected an attempt by ISIL's Abu Musab al-Barnawi to replace him. • Al-Barnawiis believed to be the son of late Boko Haram founder Mohammed Yusuf and used to be Boko Haram's spokesman. • Sporadic fighting broke out between the two factions, one headed by Shekau and the other by al-Barnawi

23. Video • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiaFQB6t5tE • https://news.vice.com/video/the-war-against-boko-haram-full-length (Vice) • https://news.vice.com/video/chads-fight-against-boko-haram • Shekeauon elections: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfBXdcUy_lI • http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/19/africa/nigeria-fight-boko-haram-analysis-sevenzo/