Nigeria: does the kidnapping of high school students from Kankara mark a resurgence of Boko Haram?
Abubakar Shekau, head of Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of high school students from Kankara in Nigeria.
(illustration photo) BOKO HARAM / AFP / File Handout
By: Clémentine Pawlotsky
2 min
The jihadist group Boko Haram is once again talking about it in Nigeria.
Its leader Abubakar Shekau claimed yesterday ((Tuesday 15/12)), in an audio recording, the kidnapping of at least 333 high school students on the night of Friday to last Saturday, in Kankara, in the state of Katsina, in the north of the country.
This is the first time that the organization has claimed an operation of such magnitude in this area.
Publicity
Several observers believe that this demand could mark a turning point in the group's expansion.
What is it really ?
Is Boko Haram gaining ground towards northwestern Nigeria?
Does the jihadist group benefit from local support?
Has he forged new alliances with jihadist groups established in neighboring Niger?
Faced with this new show of force from Boko Haram, the Nigerian authorities and army are communicating confused.
Do they really have the power to bring these high school students back, safe and sound, to their families?
Isn't this mass kidnapping an additional admission of failure for the security policy of President Muhammadu Buhari, who had promised to eradicate jihadism when he came to power in 2015?
With our guest
Marc-Antoine Pérouse de Montclos
, research director at the Institute for Research for Development (IRD), specialist in Nigeria.
Newsletter
Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Nigeria
Boko Haram
Terrorism
On the same subject
Nigeria: Abubakar Shekau of Boko Haram claims the kidnapping of high school students in Kankara
Nigeria: with the kidnapping of high school students in Kankara, the new expansion of Boko Haram