By Bineta DiagnePosted on 26-07-2019Modified on 26-07-2019 at 23:27

Established in northeastern Nigeria since the early 2000s, Jamā'at ahl al-sunna li'l-da'wa wa'l-jihād, aka Boko Haram, is originally a radical sect. Since 2009, the terrorist group has killed more than 27,000 people and displaced 2.5 million people from their homes, completely destabilizing northeastern Nigeria and the islands of Lake Chad.

Beginning of the 2000s. It is in the city of Maiduguri, capital of Borno State, that a small group of students advocates a rigorous application of sharia, in force in the northern states of Nigeria. Among them, Mohamed Yusuf, a charismatic preacher, who relies on Salafist ideology and claims an orthodox approach to Islam. In particular, he questions the educational system as taught in public schools. Hence the name of Boko Haram: " Western education is a sin ." " Mohamed Yusuf has a religious speech to denounce the deficiencies and grievances of the Nigerian government ," said Yan St-Pierre, who heads Mosecon, a center for counterterrorism analysis. Good speaker, Mohamed Yusuf conveys his ideas to the popular classes, through meetings, but also " CDs, tapes and TV shows, " says the researcher Sciences Po, Corentin Cohen.

From clandestinity to violence

Originally, this sect is an unarmed movement. But his relations with the police are tense: repressed demonstrations, arbitrary arrests ... The replicas of the sect become more and more muscular. On July 26, 2009, Boko Haram members attacked several police stations.

The Nigerian army represses the movement, destroys its headquarters, hundreds of faithful die. The arrest and then the public performance of Mohamed Yusuf by the police force topple the movement into terrorism. In a few weeks, the repression by the army makes more than a thousand victims.

Boko Haram instils terror

The performance of the charismatic preacher fuels some frustration among Boko Haram supporters. The group expands and recruits in the northeastern states like Bauchi, Yobe and Adamawa. It is embedded in the Lake Chad Basin. At his head, Imam Abubakar Shekau instils terror: his followers carry out assassinations, suicide bombings in public places. The Boko Haram also target police stations, public buildings and symbols of the federal state. The group does not hesitate to loot and confiscate property from the people.

Faced with a federal state little aware of the scope of this group, jihadists hit hard. Witness the bomb attack , on August 26, 2011, against the United Nations headquarters, located in a diplomatic district of Abuja. The explosion, caused by a car bomb in the heart of the federal capital, 13 deaths. The shock wave is important. And Boko Haram continues to nibble ground in northeastern Nigeria and Lake Chad: on December 20, 2013, the jihadists destroy the Bama military camp, August 6, 2014, the insurgents meet no resistance to seize of Gwoza , where they proclaim in the wake of an "Islamic caliphate".

On 24 November 2014, Damasak falls under the yoke of the jihadists: more than 3,000 inhabitants leave to take refuge in neighboring Niger. And finally, on January 3, 2015, hundreds of fighters armed with machetes and traveling on motorcycles and pickups surprised the residents of Baga , a commercial hub with a military base on the shores of Lake Chad. It is a real massacre, the insurgents burn a large part of the locality. This decision is a symbolic victory since Baga hosted the headquarters of the Multinational Joint Force regrouping the Nigerian, Nigerian, Chadian and Cameroonian armies.

The morale of the Nigerian troops is low. Especially since soldiers regularly run into a deficit of means: when they lack weapons or ammunition, the soldiers do not hesitate to anticipate a possible attack of the jihadists and to leave their posts.

Faced with this rapid progress, Abuja is out of date. It was only in 2013 that the federal authorities decreed a state of emergency in three states: Borno, Yobe and Adamawa. They take a long time to become aware of the seriousness of the situation. " Probably, at the beginning (of the uprising), we - I mean my team and myself - have underestimated Boko Haram's nuisance capabilities ," said President Goodluck Jonathan , in an interview with The Daily. Day on the eve of his 2015 presidential defeat.

The life of the inhabitants in the north-east is totally turned upside down. Farmers no longer have access to their land. Fearing insecurity, many left their fields where they grew tomatoes, wheat or rice to settle in makeshift shelters around big cities like Abuja or Lagos. There are currently, according to the United Nations, 1.8 million IDPs in Nigeria.

Women and youth are prime targets of Boko Haram insurgents. Forced to marry jihadists, women are also used to recruit potential jihadists. When they are not used as kamikaze to commit attacks in public places.

To mark the spirits, Boko Haram does not hesitate to attack young people. On the night of April 14-15, 2014, jihadists storm a boarding school in Chibok . They embark 276 high school girls by force. Fortunately, 57 young people manage to escape. But most of the teenage girls - most Christian - remain captive of the jihadists who sow terror by broadcasting videos showing veiled, converted to a radical Islam. These images, which circumnavigate social networks, mark international public opinion.

Divided, Boko Haram remains a permanent threat

In February 2015, Muhammadu Buhari , a regular soldier, was elected president. The former retired general is elected on a promise: that of eradicating Boko Haram. Muhammadu Buhari wants to reintroduce transparency and discipline into the ranks of an army, accused of committing extrajudicial crimes in the north-east of the country. The image of a corrupt army also sticks to his skin. Witness the arrest on December 1, 2015 of Colonel Sambo Dasuki , former National Security Advisor under Goodluck Jonathan, accused of diverting nearly $ 2 billion in the purchase of weapons to fight against Boko Haram.

The new president, Muhammadu Buhari, from Katsina (north), decides to move the Abuja military operations command center to Maiduguri, epicenter of the Boko Haram insurgency. On the ground, the security forces rely more on civilian self-defense groups, originally hunters who have mobilized to kick jihadists out of their lands. This approach is bearing fruit. Boko Haram no longer occupies the big cities of northeastern Nigeria. The jihadists are losing the forest of Sambisa , a strategic area south-east of Maiduguri. For the army, it's an important victory. Because this hostile ground of 60 000 km² was since the beginning of the crisis, the base of withdrawal of Abubakar Shekau. This former stronghold of Boko Haram is located at the border with Cameroon, Nigeria's preferred partner in this fight: since the creation of the Multinational Joint Force in 2015, Nigerian and Cameroonian soldiers exchange information on the movements of jihadists and coordinate their operations .

The jihadists, who were cornered, decided in 2015 to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State group. IS flags now float on their 4x4s. Beyond the ideological and political affinities, through this allegiance, " Abubakar Shekau seeks a certain recognition ", analyzes the researcher Corentin Cohen. Only this gesture amplifies internal divisions. IS calls Abu Musab Al Barnawi head of the movement, to the detriment of Shekau , regularly announced for dead or seriously wounded. Two factions emerge, with two radically different strategies.

► See also: What about the links between Boko Haram and the Islamic State group?

On one side, the faction faithful to Abubakar Shekau, present on the border with Cameroon and that of Niger. She embodies a hard and sectarian line.

On the other, the faction of the Islamic province in West Africa (Iswap), anchored on the islands and around Lake Chad. Influenced by Mamman Nur, this trend is more open to local populations. " This faction acts in quasi-state, observes Vincent Foucher, researcher at the CNRS : they have access to health, they regulate markets and organize commercial channels. They understood that it was necessary to adopt a less sectarian attitude ", continues this analyst. " This is part of the new offensive they have been using since 2016-2017 to restart the offensive, " concludes the researcher.

These groups are divided, but their nuisance capacities remain considerable. Between July and December 2018, there are at least 22 attacks by Iswap against military bases, which each time lose many items and especially weapons that terrorists seize. Despite the voluntarism of President Muhammadu Buhari, who keeps repeating that " Boko Haram is technically defeated, " in the field, the Nigerian armed forces sometimes seem unreactive. Or even under-equipped. Thus, in Arege, on November 29, 2018, while members of Boko Haram arrive on board motorcycles and pick-ups, wielding Kalashnikovs, " the soldiers were short of ammunition after successfully repelling the attack, " entrusts an officer on condition of anonymity.

► See also: Terrorism: Boko Haram, 10 years of continuous expansion

The Nigerian army is struggling to overcome it. Engulfed in recurrent corruption problems " the Nigerian army lacks resources and its tactics are not adjusted, " said Yan St-Pierre, expert on counterterrorism. As for the Multinational Joint Force (MFF), it is still slow to be fully operational due to lack of funding.

► Read also: How to stabilize the Lake Chad region in the face of Boko Haram?

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