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Boko Haram is opening up new fronts as militants seek to carve out an
Islamic state in the north-east, according to Marin Roberts, Senior Sub-
Saharan Africa Analyst, IHS Country Risk. Please feel free to quote
excerpts from the new analysis below.
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Boko Haram Opening New Fronts
By Martin Roberts, Senior Sub-Saharan Africa Analyst, IHS Country Risk
Boko Haram is showing evidence of a strategy divided into three
active zones of operation: Southern Nigeria, the Middle Belt and
North Centre, and the North-East, where militants are extending their
control of non-urban areas.
The most threatening development is Boko Haram's assertion of
territorial control in the northeastern Borno State, leaving the group
free to train militants for further attacks and hold hostages for ransom.
Boko Haram is seeking to carve out an Islamic state in the north-east.
Renewed links between Boko Haram and its radical jihadist off-shoot
Ansaru are driving a higher risk of further attacks taking place in
Lagos and southern Nigeria.
The use of suicide bombers, particularly female, is behind a rapidly
rising rate of mass-casualty attacks and targeted assassination
attempts in the Middle Belt and northern cities.
Nigeria's security services are in danger of being overwhelmed as Boko
Haram concentrates on three main areas of operations and uses new
tactics, including female suicide bombers.
As Nigeria approaches the final six months before a general election in
February 2015, there are clear indications that Boko Haram is
implementing a multi-faceted strategy aimed at increasing the rate of
deadly attacks throughout the country. Since late June, there have been
multiple attacks in four of Nigeria’s top five cities, including a twin
improvised explosive device (IED) attack in Lagos on 25 June; another
bombing in the federal capital Abuja on 25 June; twin assassination
attempts in Kaduna on 23 July; and a series of suicide bombings by
women, particularly in the most populous city in the north, Kano.
At the same time, Boko Haram is extending its control of non-urban areas
in the three north-eastern states subject to a state of emergency (Borno,
Yobe and Adamawa), while also staging deadly attacks and kidnappings
throughout this area as well as in neighbouring Cameroon.
Triple focus for operations
While the Nigerian security services are still struggling to muster an
effective response to Boko Haram, the group is showing evidence of a
strategy divided into three active zones of operation:
Southern Nigeria: where a network of militants is emerging that likely
includes Muslims from southern Nigerian ethnic groups.
Middle Belt and North Centre: where Boko Haram is carrying out bombings
of churches, malls and government facilities on a weekly basis.
North-East: where the group is focusing increasingly on the border region
between Borno State and northern Cameroon, building a safe haven to
train militants, holding hostages for ransom and launching attacks virtually
daily that target isolated towns and military deployments.
The new threat to southern parts of Nigeria, previously thought to be
beyond the range of Boko Haram, was underlined by the twin IED attack in
Lagos near the Apapa port area on 25 June. The incident was
subsequently claimed in a video message by Boko Haram leader Abubakar
Shekau. Although this may be an opportunistic assertion of responsibility
for an act perpetrated by a group only loosely allied with Boko Haram,
Shekau has repeatedly threatened to attack Western interests in southern
Nigeria, including oil facilities in the Niger Delta. It is more likely that the
Lagos attack was planned by Boko Haram off-shoot Ansaru, many of
whose militants trained in northern Mali with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic
Maghreb (AQIM) in 2012, some with the specific intention of building up
expertise to target southern Nigeria.
Tactic of suicide bombings has been stepped up
The activities of Ansaru had been curtailed by French intervention in
northern Mali from January 2013 onwards, but signs of their higher profile
and renewed links with Boko Haram are suggested by the wave of
bombings in the Middle Belt since the first explosion at the Nyanya bus
park in the Abuja suburbs in April 2014. The scale of attacks is escalating
rapidly, and increasingly featuring the use of suicide bombings, using both
vehicles and also explosive belts strapped to individuals, a tactic repeatedly
used by Ansaru and its AQIM-trained militants in its main area of
operations in the Middle Belt and Kano when it was formerly most active in
2011 and 2012.
Boko Haram is seeking to carve out an Islamic state in the north-east
The biggest immediate concern to Nigeria, however, is arguably the
military’s loss of control over non-urban areas in the north-east. In aiming to
prevent Nigeria's military from accessing the rural north-east in any force,
Boko Haram seems to be taking the first steps in establishing a limited
Islamic state that it wants to see instituted across the Muslim-majority
north. It is less interested in establishing control over the population, which
has largely fled to neighbouring countries or to Maiduguri and other major
towns. The main purpose is likely to establish a fairly secure zone where
militants can receive further training and hold hostages for ransom or
exchange. This includes more than 200 schoolgirls still missing after being
kidnapped from Chibok on 14 April, as well as an estimated 20 hostages
taken from the Cameroonian town of Kolofata on 27 July, including the wife
of Cameroon's influential deputy prime minister Amadou Ali.
Outlook and Implications
The security situation facing the Nigerian government is deteriorating at an
accelerating pace, and there is little sign that authorities are capable of
responding to the challenge posed by Boko Haram in any of its three zones
of operations. The wave of suicide bombings, particularly by individuals,
poses an immense challenge for the security services to provide adequate
protection for targets in Lagos, including Western businesses,
headquarters of international organisations, hotels, government offices and
security installations. The more limited support networks in Lagos and the
south mean attacks will be fairly sporadic, but they will continue to occur on
a frequent basis in the Middle Belt and north central cities. Moreover, while
there is no challenge to Boko Haram's control of the north-east, it is free to
accelerate the training and despatch of militants to keep up the tempo of
these attacks.
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