Boko Haram 'Seize' Strategic Bama Town in Borno

Nigeria's militant Islamist group Boko Haram has seized the key north-eastern town of Bama after fierce fighting with government forces, residents say.

Thousands of civilians have fled the town, along with soldiers, they added.

The military has not yet officially commented on the claim that it has lost control of Bama, the second biggest town in Borno state.

Last month, Boko Haram said it had established an Islamic state in areas it controls in north-eastern Nigeria.

If confirmed, the capture of Bama would be an extremely significant development and would raise concerns that Boko Haram's next target will be Maiduguri, the state capital about 70km (45 miles) away, says BBC Hausa service editor Mansur Liman in the capital, Abuja.

It would be the biggest town under Boko Haram control.

Residents told BBC Hausa that Boko Haram captured Bama after heavy fighting on Sunday and Monday.

The military had initially repelled Boko Haram's assault, but the group returned with reinforcements to seize the town, the residents said.

The militants, who travelled in armoured trucks, first took control of the military barracks, they added.

Soldiers and residents fled on foot, many of them walking all the way to Maiduguri, residents told the BBC.

Several security sources said Boko Haram had over-run much of Bama and there were heavy casualties on both sides, Reuters news agency reports.

About 70 militants had been killed, the Associated Press quoted security sources as saying.

On Monday, the military said on its Twitter account that the air force had been used to "repel and dislodge" Boko Haram from Bama.

The most recent census, in 2006, showed the town had a population of about 270,000.

Source:
BBC

Nigerian Military Well-Equipped, Motivated To Dislodge Boko Haram Terrorists In Gwosa

The Armed Forces is working to set Gwoza town in Borno state free of terrorist elements and will leave no
portion of the country for terrorist occupation Defence spokesman Major General Chris Olukolade said
yesterday.

Addressing newsmen in Abuja yesterday at an event organised by the I-Nigerian Initiative, a non-governmental organization working to change the negative perception of Nigerians, Olukolade said “all we can say is that we are still working and we are not leaving that community or any part of Nigeria for terrorist to occupy.”

He said: “No portion of this country is available for terrorist to occupy, if they appear to be doing so, it’s just a joke and with respect to these locations, everything is being done to ensure that everywhere in Nigeria is secured enough.”

General Olukolade dismissed allegations that the Nigeria military is not motivated or equipped to fight the insurgents.
“The Nigerian military is well trained for the kind of war that it is presently engaged. Even before the advent of
terrorism, our training doctrine has factored in counter terrorism right from the beginning.”

On military weapons and equipment, the defense spokesman said: “Be sure that it is incremental but you would see them when they are in action,” while denying allegations of corruption in the military. He noted that such claims only demoralizes the military.

Speaking on reports of the operational capabilities of the insurgents, the Defence spokesman said, “It is not likely that the level of freedom of action attributed to these guys is as potent as it is made to believe,” adding that, “the whole of the current recent trouble is that they are being attacked where they thought they could settle.”

He also said the probe over the Amnesty International report alleging extra judicial killings by soldiers is
ongoing.

General Olukolade explained that soldiers complaining about rotation from posting in the northeastern part of the country are being mischievous, noting that the military has no place for troop rotation when posted within the country.

“If you are in foreign mission yes there is rotation, and let me tell you the same people making this complains, when they go on foreign missions and they say it is time for rotation they will be asking for extension because they are looking for dollars,” he said.

Source:
DailyTrust

Boko Haram: Solution Lies With Northern Elders - Aliyat Yakub

A friend wanted to visit the north, and she was so scared of coming that she had to consult her pastors on whether to come or not. It is so unfortunate that this is the situation our region finds itself today.

Gone are the days when everybody in the country wanted to have a feel of the northern culture. That was in the good old days. The security situation has left the North in ruins. As a result, northern political leaders, traditional rulers, elders and religious leaders should not sit by and watch Boko Haram destroy the region completely. It is unfortunate that the group, created by some selfish politicians for their political gains, has grown into a monster they can no longer control.

Today, people are being killed on a daily basis in Borno State. Although majority of Boko Haram’s atrocities are being carried out in Borno and Yobe states, the whole region is suffering from this madness.

Our economic life has been ruined by Boko Haram. Poverty is at an all- time high. Even before the advent of Boko Haram, we were trailing the other regions in terms of economy, education, among others, but today, the gap has
been widened to the extent that if Boko Haram cease all hostilities today, it would take about 50 years to return to the level we were before.
When we finally get back to that level, we will now start working towards running after the other regions, which would have gone far ahead of us.

Many businesses have been ruined, and others have simply relocated to the more stable regions in the country.
It is now time for our leaders in the North to come together and look at ways through which they can encourage the leadership of the sect to stop all its evil activities.

While they are waging a war against the
Nigerian government, and the President
Goodluck Jonathan-led administration, it is the people of the North who are suffering.
Those being killed on a daily basis are not the president’s kinsmen. They are northerners. The Christians being killed are also northerners.
These killings affect Jonathan in no way, and it won’t stop him from completing his term as president, or even from securing another term in office. If there is anybody losing from this heinous crime, it is the northerners.

I hope our leaders can finally convince Mr. Abubakar Shekau and his evil foot soldiers to stop wasting innocent peoples’ lives.

Boko Haram Renders 650,000 Nigerians Homeless - United Nations

Attacks by Boko Haram in the crisis-hit northeast have forced nearly 650,000 people from their homes, the United Nations humanitarian office (OCHA) said Tuesday, an increase of nearly 200,000 since May.

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) on its part reported that about 1,000 people trying to escape the fighting had fled to an uninhabited island on Lake Chad across northeastern border. "The group, mainly women and children, is in urgent need of food, water, shelter and
medical care," the UNHCR said. They reached the remote island of Choua on Thursday after fleeing a Boko Haram attack in their hometown of Kolikolia,
according to the refugee agency.

Chad has pledged to send two helicopters to the island to help evacuate the Nigerian refugees to a nearby area where they can be temporarily settled with host
communities, the UNHCR added. The refugee agency said it was sending staff to the area to coordinate the relief effort. Thousands have fled over Nigeria's borders into Cameroon, Chad and Niger seeking refuge from Boko Haram's relentless violence, which has killed more than 2,000 civilians this year and left scores of villages destroyed.

Relief workers have avoided setting up refugee or internally displaced persons (IDP) camps, but some fear camps may soon become necessary, especially in
Nigeria, as the security forces struggle to contain the escalating Islamist violence. OCHA said 436,608 people have been displaced in the three states - Adamawa,
Borno and Yobe -- that were placed under emergency rule in May 2013.

The agency put the IDP figure at 250,000 in May this year. Another 210,085 have fled their homes in areas neighbouring the state of emergency zone, bringing the total number of people displaced by Boko Haram unrest to nearly 650,000, OCHA reported.

ThisDay

Boko Haram Trails Nigerians To Chad, Kills 6

Gunmen suspected to be members of the Boko Haram sect Monday crossed over to a village in Chad and killed.six Nigerians who were taking refuge there.

Sources said the insurgents stormed Dubuwa village in Chad from Kirenowa, a border town in Marte Local Government Area of Borno State.
About two weeks ago, the Boko Haram assailants attacked Kirenowa, killed some residents and burnt public and private houses, a development which forced the locals to seek refuge in Chad.

Mohammed Yusuf, a farmer from Kirenowa told our.correspondent in Maiduguri yesterday that the insurgents pursued the fleeing residents to Dubuwa and killed six.
“After the attack on our village two weeks ago, many crossed over to Chad, some to Cameroon and many others to other places in northern Borno. Sadly, the attackers pursued those in Kirenowa and succeeded in killing six people,” Yusuf said.

Some security sources that spoke off record confirmed that like in southern part of the state, the Boko Haram
fighters are attacking villages in the northern part.
“Our troops are intensifying efforts to contain the situation but the truth is that the locals must always volunteer information on the movements of the
terrorists. This is key to achieving positive results,” one of the security officials said.

Kirenowa was the first place that Nigerian forced dislodged a Boko Haram camp in 2013, shortly after the
declaration of a state of emergency.
“From all indications, the insurgents are fully back in Marte and other local government areas along the shores of the Lake Chad. We pray something urgent would be done so that we would not have a repeat of what happened last year when the Boko Haram fighters hoisted their flags in our villages and indoctrinated our children,” Abba Kolomi, a fisherman said.

Courtesy:
Daily Trust

United States Surveillance Planes Searching for Boko Haram Abductees Spot Girls in Nigeria

Recent U.S. surveillance flights over northeastern Nigeria showed what appeared to be large groups of girls held together in remote locations, raising hopes among domestic and foreign officials that they are among the group that Boko Haram abducted from a boarding school in April, U.S. and Nigerian officials said.

The surveillance suggests that at least some of the 219 schoolgirls still held captive haven't been forced into
marriage or sex slavery, as had been feared, but instead are being used as bargaining chips for the release of
prisoners.

The U.S. aerial imagery matches what Nigerian officials say they hear from northern Nigerians who have
interacted with the Islamist insurgency: that some of Boko Haram's most famous set of captives are getting special treatment, compared with the hundreds of other girls the group is suspected to have kidnapped. Boko Haram appears to have seen the schoolgirls as of higher value, given the global attention paid to their plight, those officials said.

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan, who faces re- election in February, is under political pressure to secure the girls' release, with some people urging him to agree to a prisoner swap.
His government has ruled out a rescue operation, saying it is unwilling to risk the girls' lives, or a prisoner swap.
"We don't exchange innocent people for criminals. That is not in the cards," said Mr. Jonathan's spokesman, Reuben Abati, last week in an interview.

In early July, U.S. surveillance flights over northeastern Nigeria spotted a group of 60 to 70 girls held in an open
field, said two U.S. defense officials. Late last month, they spotted a set of roughly 40 girls in a different field.
When surveillance flights returned, both sets of girls had been moved. U.S. intelligence analysts say they don't have enough information to confirm whether the two groups of girls they saw are the same, they said.

They also can't say whether those groups included any of the girls the group has held since April. But U.S. and Nigerian officials said they believe they are indeed those schoolgirls.
"It's unusual to find a large group of young women like that in an open space," said one U.S. defense official.
"We're assuming they're not a rock band of hippies out there camping."

A wave of intermediaries acting on their own has tried to negotiate the girls' release, Mr. Abati said, adding that the president has neither authorized nor discouraged those efforts. Several of those intermediaries have said Boko Haram's leader, Abubakar Shekau, has ordered his fighters to treat the girls as valuable hostages—not sex slaves—one senior Nigerian security adviser said.

"He gave a directive that anybody found touching any of the girls should be killed immediately," the adviser said.
"If true, it is cheering."
It would also show that Boko Haram is trying to follow an al Qaeda tactic of swapping hostages for money and
political gain.

Boko Haram has used hostages in the past to demand the exchange of its prisoners held in both Nigeria and
Cameroon, which was one of the conditions for the release of a French family from captivity last year.
Now, the group appears to be testing the bargaining power of a group of girls who had been ordinary teenagers at a school—until their abduction on the night of April 14. That night, fighters with the Islamist insurgency—which is opposed to modern education—stormed a boarding school and drove 276 girls away hours before their final exams. Fifty-seven later escaped.

The captivity of the rest became a cause célèbre, prompting a Twitter campaign, #BringBackOurGirls, that was joined by notable figures including Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton. It also spurred Boko Haram's latest effort to get its captives released from crowded Nigerian prisons—a long-standing grievance. Three months after seizing the girls, Boko Haram's leader, Mr. Shekau, appeared in a video demanding a prisoner exchange. "You are saying bring back our girls," thundered the bearded gunman, before firing his AK-47 into the air. "We are saying bring back our men!"

Dozens of demonstrators still gather in the capital each day to press for the girls' freedom. Their rallies have become a referendum on whether Nigerian women particularly poor, young, Muslim girls— are valued by a government of mostly wealthy, elderly, Christian men.
Mr. Abati said Mr. Jonathan has worked tirelessly to win the girls' freedom.

It isn't clear how many of the girls Boko Haram can deliver. A former Nigerian president, Olusegun Obasanjo, who has a history of contact with the group, has said some of the girls are likely dead or pregnant. Only about 130 of them—out of 219 missing— appeared in the sole video of the girls that Boko Haram has ever provided.

Meanwhile, the international effort to find the girls has waned: The U.S. military is now carrying out just one
surveillance flight a day, mostly by manned aircraft, totaling only 35 to 40 hours a week, said U.S. defense
officials, as drones have been shifted back toward other operations.

Some accounts suggest the burden of providing for scores of girls has become a point of dissension in Boko Haram's ranks.
In July, four girls and women aged 16 to 22 hid in their bedrooms as Boko Haram fighters broke into their home in the town of Damboa, they each said in an interview last week. They feared they would be kidnapped.
When their aunt, Fatima Abba, argued on their behalf. The roughly 20 Boko Haram insurgents decided not to
kidnap them—and instead began to complain about the scores of schoolgirls they already have.
"They are always crying. They behave like children," Ms. Abba quoted the Boko Haram fighters as saying of the
schoolgirls. "We don't want them around."

Source:
WSJ

Boko Haram Kills Nigerian Army Captain, 8 Months After His Wedding

Members of the dreaded Boko Haram Islamic Sect, have killed Captain Benjamin Sule, a Nigerian army officer who just wedded eight months ago.

A close military friend of the late Captain Sule told SaharaReporters that Boko Haram gunmen killed the young, newly wed officer in an attack on a military contingent over the weekend.

“Captain Sule was killed in a battle launched by Boko Haram fighters against our troops between Saturday and Sunday,” said his military friend who is based in the Ikom Barracks in Cross River State. The officer, who provided wedding photos of Captain Sule, added that he and other friends of the deceased officer “received the news with utmost shock. He was killed between Saturday and Sunday, but we only got the information today [Monday].”

He said he and Captain Sule had been friends since their days in secondary school. The source said the Nigerian Army later posted Captain Sule to Cross River State. “It was from here that he went on a military duty to the Borno area.”

The source told SaharaReporters that he last spoke with Captain Sule a week ago. “We talked over the phone and he told me that he was fine, but said we should continue praying for him.”

The officer said he was distraught that the captain’s death has made a widow out of the young wife Captain Sule married in November 2013.

Our source disclosed that Captain Sule’s wife and family were aware of his death, even though the Defense Headquarters was yet to officially announce his death at the time of this report.

SR

President Jonathan Using Third Parties To Negotiate With Boko Haram To Free Abducted Chibok Girls

The president of Nigeria disclosed Monday that his government is using third parties to talk to Islamist
extremists and try to secure the safe release of the 200 schoolgirls they kidnapped, saying military action could prove too deadly.

In an exclusive interview with The Washington Times, President Goodluck Jonathan also said that U.S. help during the schoolgirls crisis has not produced any results.

“They have been with us for over a month, and we have not been able to get the girls out,” he said. “So you really see that the help has not yet resulted [in] something positive. I wouldn’t say they have helped or they have not helped. Basically they are there to help with intelligence gathering and so on.”

In Washington for an African leaders’ summit with President Obama, Mr. Jonathan directly addressed the
criticism both inside his country and abroad to his response to the terrorist group Boko Haram’s kidnapping of the girls from the town of Chibok in April, saying a swift military response likely would have resulted in the death of the children.

“We have not been able to get [an answer]. How do we get these girls out?” he said. “If it is to risk a few dead
bodies, it is easier. You can blast the place and carry the corpses. But is that what we have to do? So it is delicate, and that’s why we are proceeding with caution.”

Mr. Jonathan, who faces re-election in
2015, disclosed that he has authorized third parties to try to secure the girls’ safe release.
“Negotiations from Day One. We have set up a committee — what I call a dialogue committee — [for] the challenge we have in the north, even before the kidnapping of the Chibok girls. We have a team. And we encourage people to assist them. We do negotiate,” he said. “Quite a number of people have come with different information. We encourage them. But none of them have yielded any results.”

Nigerian and U.S. advisers to Mr. Jonathan immediately clarified his remarks after the interview, stating the Nigerian government was not directly negotiating with Boko Haram but instead using intermediaries.

“The president is not negotiating with Boko Haram. He is, however, encouraging dialogue between the sect and the government,” said Lanny Davis, a former Clinton White House adviser who has been advising the Jonathan administration on international media strategy related to the crisis.
“Recently, even before the girls were taken, he set up a committee to dialogue with Boko Haram. Currently,
there are third parties reaching out to Boko Haram to secure the safe return of the girls, and the administration is actively encouraging these backroom
initiatives,” he said.

The kidnappings fueled international outrage and spurred a social media campaign in the West with the
rallying cry of “#BringBackOurGirls.”
Mr. Jonathan, who belatedly accepted offers of help from the Obama administration to find the girls, said
American help hasn’t produced any measurable results.

Mr. Jonathan took baby steps on the carpet of his hotel suite to demonstrate the impact so far of the effort by the US and other global allies to help his country finds the girls — “one fraction of a centimeter.”
“It’s like when we are learning elementary physics in secondary school, and they will define ‘walk’ as ‘effort by distance,’” he said. “No matter what the effort, if you don’t move the load by a distance, the walk is zero. The effort I put, multiplied by zero, is zero. No walk. Yes, they are doing something, but no result yet.”

Mr. Davis, the adviser to President Jonathan, said Nigeria was appreciative of the help offered by numerous countries.

Washington Times

Amnesty International Claims Nigerian Army Committed 'War Crimes'

Nigeria's army has committed atrocities in the north-east in its fight against Islamist militants belonging to Boko Haram, Amnesty International says.

The campaign group said it had seen "gruesome footage" including alleged members of the military slitting the throats of detainees.
The Nigerian authorities said such barbarity had no place in the military and promised to investigate.

Boko Haram has been waging an insurgency in Nigeria since 2009.
Thousands of people have been killed in a series of bombings and assassinations in the north-east and in the capital, Abuja, this year alone.

Amnesty says footage obtained from multiple sources on a trip to Borno state, in the north, "includes horrific images of detainees having their throats slit one by one and dumped in mass graves".

The perpetrators "appear to be members of the Nigerian military and the "Civilian Joint Task Force" (CJTF), state-sponsored militias," the organisation adds.
"The ghastly images are backed up by the numerous.testimonies we have gathered which suggest that
extrajudicial executions are, in fact, regularly carried out by the Nigerian military and CJTF," says Amnesty
International Secretary General Salil Shetty.

The Nigerian authorities say they are "deeply concerned" about the footage in circulation, adding: "That level of
barbarism and impunity has no place in the Nigerian military."

Guardian

Defence HQ's Response To Amnesty International's Claims of 'War Crimes'

The Nigerian military takes the issue of Human Rights seriously and will never condone any proven case of abuse by its personnel. Military authorities are deeply concerned about the set of video footage being circulated and which unfortunately has also become reference data for Amnesty International in its report.

Much as the scenes depicted in these videos are alien to our operations and doctrines, it has to be investigated to ensure that such practices have not
crept, surreptitiously into the system.  The Defence Headquarters considers these allegations too grievous to be associated with Nigerian troops, considering the doctrinal and operational contents of the training
imparted to personnel on a continuous basis; emphasizing the importance of respect for Human Rights and dignity of human person as well as observance of humanitarian laws.

Notwithstanding the cases of impersonations that have pervaded the counter terrorism operations in Nigeria and many other related issues which cast doubts on the claims made in the video, the military authorities view those grave allegations very seriously, more so as it borders on the integrity of the ongoing counter-terrorism operation, which must be sustained in the interest of our national survival.

Consequently, the Defence Headquarters in addition to the already existing Joint Investigation Team (JIT) has constituted a team of senior officers and legal cum forensic experts to study the video footage and the resultant allegations of infractions in order to ascertain the veracity of the claims with a view to identifying those behind such acts. This will further determine and stimulate necessary legal action against any personnel or anyone found culpable in accordance with the provisions of the law.

The Nigerian Armed Forces cannot condone any action or inaction that tramples on the right to life of any Nigerian. The ultimate objective of Nigeria’s counter-terrorism operation is the complete cessation of the heinous and barbaric activities of the terrorists and to stamp out every vestige of terrorism in our country with the application of international best practices in such operations.

It will therefore, be absurd for the Nigerian Armed Forces as an institution to perpetrate such unprofessional acts in the manner and level depicted in that video as alleged by Amnesty International.  Indeed, that level of barbarism and impunity has no place in the Nigerian military.  Respect for the sanctity of life is always boldly emphasized in our doctrinal trainings. It must thus be reiterated that the Nigerian military is a very well organized professional body of troops whose conducts in war and peace times are guided comprehensively by law.

The Armed Forces of Nigeria is conscious of the nation’s obligation to observe all rules, regulations and commitments in all activities, and wishes to reassure all Nigerians, the civil societies and the international community that it will not encourage or condone any form of human rights violation as depicted in the said video.

Nigerian Defence HQ

Countering Radical Islamic Extremism: The Niger State Example

On Tuesday June 3, 2014, the Niger State government dislodged members of a radical and controversial Islamic group, the Nibrassiya Huda Islamic sect, from Lapai, in Lapai Local Government Area of the state. The sect’s camp had been situated inside a forest on the outskirts of the town. In that raid, which was carried out by the military, no fewer than 240 members were dislodged.

The sect, led by Sheik Mohammed Abubakar, had become a menace to the public and the traditional institution of the town. Members of the sect had been accused of disturbing public peace by attacking people who did not share their views. Their members viewed other Muslim adherents as largely misguided and treated them with no regard. Indeed, the Etsu Lapai, Alhaji Umar Bago Tafida, had accused the leader of the sect of teaching and propagating wrong doctrines that have no root in Islam.

Before routing the sect from the location, the state government had, in May 13 this year, revoked the Certificate of Occupancy of the land on which the camp was situated and gave an eviction notice of two weeks to the sect.

This is not the first time the government of Niger state is taking proactive measures to stem religion extremism. In 2010, the government took a preemptive initiative against the Darul Islam group, led by Amrul Bashir Abdullahi, settled on the outskirts of the state. Earlier in
2009, the Niger State government had set up an interreligious body to promote peace and friendly living among the adherents of the various religions in the state.

The last three decades have witnessed a proliferation of religious sects and groups in Nigeria. Many of them have extremist orientation, including a propensity to violence.
The most problematic of these sects in Northern was the “Nigerian Taliban” which many think transmuted into the Boko Haram sect.

A review of the evolution of the Boko Haram sect and other violent religious movements shows that they pass through several phases, usually marked by radical and messianic doctrines. They may not initially espouse violence but as they become strong and institutionalised with a large and fanatical following, their leaders begin to take on the image of a messiah, called to create a world
without the social ills of corruption, drunkenness and prostitution. The bulk of those who flock to such groups are usually the dispossessed, the disturbed, those in trouble, those in states of hopelessness, those who seek a world free from the frustrations of ordinary life, and those in search of quick solutions to challenging problems. That is why many have linked the rise of Boko Haram, especially its capacity to recruit
persons, including teenagers, to the relatively severe level of poverty in Northeastern Nigeria.

Terrorist organisations capitalise on an environment in which their ideology resonates and smart, competent individuals are then motivated to act either with or on behalf of the organisation because they consider their grievances legitimate.

The likelihood of ideological resonance is greater when members of a community are desperate for justice, social agency, human dignity, a sense of belonging, or positive identity as they live in a variety of depressingly negative or outrageous social conditions.

Their intense outrage or hatred of a specific entity, because of their actions, translates into suicidal opposition to prevailing conditions and systems of authority. The extent to which the early apprehension of the emerging extremist groups in Niger State has saved Nigeria from housing additional terror groups may be a subject of speculation. But it is clear that preemptive measures are central to addressing the challenge of terror. There is always a need for
intelligence backed by prompt action.

Terrorism cannot be addressed by means of hard power alone. That is why several individuals and groups have called for a variety of strategies, including dialogue with the sect.
There is a need to improve conditions of life and mount campaigns to win the hearts and minds of the people and communities in those areas.
Such moves are important elements of soft power strategies. Dealing with terrorism requires preemptive measures like those taken by the Niger State government and more. We believe that if the Boko Haram had been apprehended as a small religious sect before it blossomed, it would not have become the Frankenstein monster that it is today.

We call on state governments to collaborate with the security agencies in intelligence gathering and in taking preemptive action against ‘shadow’ economies in their states. These may
be underground, covert, or illegal businesses that trade in small arms and light weapons, hard drugs, or religious groups that propagate hatred, violence and other destructive values. These provide the infrastructure for terrorist organisations to operate in.

Such economies make financing easy for terrorist groups and render their detection difficult.

Tribune

Anxiety Mounts Over Whereabout of Detained Boko Haram Chief ‘Butcher’ - Muhammed Zakari

The lack of inter-agency coordination between security forces in Nigeria appears to be playing out again in
Nigeria as Police and military authority appears lost on the where about of suspected Boko Haram chief butcher, Mohammed Zakari.

The suspect was arrested on July 15 after a counter-insurgency operation in Balmo forest in Bauchi State, which was rated as the major armoury of the sect and has been undergoing interrogation in a police facility.

The inability to account for the where about of Zakari is coming few days after another suspected Boko Haram Kingpin, Farouk Abubakar allegedly escaped from custody.
Abubakar was arrested by the Nigerian troops in the Darazo-Jigawa operations early last month and was detained alongside 3 other members in 33AB Bauchi, but a report alleged that he escaped from custody on 25th July 2014.

The sad reality according to report is that the Military Police reportedly didn’t realize his absence in the cell until August 1.
While Farouk Abubakar is believed to have escaped from prison custody, nothing is known about Muhammed
Zakari. Is he alive or dead, no one can tell?

According to The Nation, a source claimed that the suspect was in Bauchi; another said he had been transferred to a secret location in Jos.
It was gathered that the tension over the suspect’s whereabouts was heightened by the fact that he had not been grilled by the military and other security
agencies.

A top security source, who spoke in confidence with our correspondent, confirmed that there was disquiet over
the fate of the suspect because the police did not state the extent of their investigation into his activities.
“No one can also explain who is keeping the suspect in the last two weeks. There are different claims on whether he is in Bauchi, Jos or Abuja,” the source said,
adding: “It could also not be confirmed whether he is still alive or dead during encounters. The situation is creating fears in the states under emergency rule.
“Those from these states have been raising concerns on Zakari’s actual status.”

It was also learnt that there were issues about the lack of coordination between the police and the military and
security agencies.
A military source, who spoke last night, said: “Well, the police arrested the suspect they should be in the best
position to account for his whereabouts.
“So far, we have not been involved in the quizzing of the suspect.”
Attempts to get official confirmation from the police last night did not yield results.

A text message to the Force Public Relations Officer, ACP Frank Mba, was not replied as at 8pm.

abusidiqu.com

"Boko Haram Effect": Real Estate Prices At All Time Low in Parts of Nigeria

The unrelenting violence perpetrated by the Boko Haram insurgents has taken its toll on the real estate sector in most states in northern Nigeria, where the prices of properties have significantly been crashed.

Prices of properties have drastically falling to an all time low, THISDAY investigations have revealed.
Besides crashing the prices of property, especially in the North-eastern states, public property worth billions of naira have gone down the drain through the
destructive acts of the terrorist group.

Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State told THISDAY recently that more than 900 schools had been reduced
to rubble by the sect in his state.
The destruction of private and public buildings in the region has led to an all time crash of property prices, as has never been experienced in the North-eastern part of the country.

Mr. Mohammed Aliyu, an indigene of Edo State, who relocated to Abuja with his family from Maiduguri last year, spoke to THISDAY, while counting his losses.
He said: “I had a four-bedroom bungalow, with all the appurtenances in a choice area in Maiduguri, going for
N500,000 per annum, yet no buyer has come up for it.
It is that bad. There are many vacant houses and apartments in the city without occupiers. This is what
the insurgency has done to me.”

Mr. Femi Stephen Alao, a Kaduna-based architect and estate developer, said there was no doubt that insecurity has had an adverse effect on the property
market in Kaduna city and adjoining towns.

At Tundun Wada, Kawo and Kabala west, an upscale area in Kaduna city, prices for three-bedroom homes
have nosedived to as low as between N60,000 and N200, 000 per annum. In the past the apartments used to go for between N400,000 and N600,000, he
explained.
“In all of these areas, real estate businesses have ground to halt. You cannot find developers on site
working now,” he said.

However, Alao said that the southern parts of Kaduna, like Gonigora, Bana-Wa, Chikun, Angwua and several
areas of that state were experiencing a hike in rent because a majority of non-indigenes in these zones believe that the areas are safe havens.

A plot of land in Angwua now sells for N1 million, whereas it used to sell for less than N500,000 per plot
a few years back.
Corroborating Alao’s assertion, the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Benue State Investment and Property Company Limited (BIPC), Mrs. Brigid Sheidu, said the security challenges in the north had affected the company’s revenue from its property unit in Kaduna State.

“This has affected our guest house facility in Kaduna township. Unlike in the past, business was booming but
because of the insecurity, we have lost most of our clientele as not many people patronise like they used to in the past. But we hope that things will change for the better,” she said.

Speaking in the same vein, the National President, Real Estate Development Association of Nigeria (REDAN),
Mr. Emmanuel Olabode Afolayan, acknowledged that insurgent activities in the North-east and other states in
the north had done unquantifiable damage to the real estate sector.
He said: “I can tell you authoritatively that nothing is presently ongoing in some parts of the north, except a
few states like Sokoto, Kebbi and Gombe States. In other states, where there is a serious security upheaval,
construction and building activities are at their lowest ebb; this is a big problem for all of us.

“For instance, in Borno and Adamawa States, our members are not building at all. In fact, no bank is ready to provide them facilities in states where there
are security challenges. No workmen are even interested in working in those areas, so transactions in the real estate sector are today almost non-existent.”

On how much has been lost to insurgency especially in the areas affected, he said: “Honestly, it will be pretty difficult to roll out figures now as we are still counting the losses, but what I can authoritatively tell you is that
most of our members have not really lost their building.

However activities are practically at a low ebb." Vice-President, REDAN, North-central, as well as the Managing Director of AIS Ltd, Mr. Sunday Idachaba, said the level of activities as far as the built sector was concerned had no doubt been affected by rising insecurity especially in the North-east.

He explained that the real estate industry involves the movement of various categories of workers like
engineers, masonry foremen and other artisans but when an area is undermined, it would be difficult to go
there to work.
“No matter the amount of money you offer workers, they will be reluctant to work in an insecure environment. So certainly the real estate sector has
nose-dived for now in those areas. People are not willing to buy homes in a place where there is insecurity.
“Property prices have crashed in cities like Maiduguri and Yobe. People are willing to sell, yet nobody is
willing to buy. This is the challenge that we are facing at the moment,” he added.

ThisDay Newspaper

Boko Haram Threatens To Attack Akwa Ibom State

The Akwa State Government, Friday , said it had received text messages from the Boko Haram terrorist group threatening to attack public places in the state.

In a statement issued by the state Commissioner for Information and Communications, Mr. Aniekan Umanah,
he said the public places targeted include churches, markets and schools, among others.

Boko Haram: Nigeria Raises N60 Billion to Assist Terror Victims

The federal government on Thursday realised over N60 billion as individuals and groups donated to the Victims of Terror Support Fund launched in Abuja.

The fund is expected to be used for the rehabilitation of victims of terror attacks across the nation.
Over 13,000 people have been killed in attacks by the Boko Haram sect while hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced and thousands of property destroyed.

Police Discover Buried Arms, IEDs In Bauchi State

The state’s police spokesman, Mohammed Haruna (a deputy of police) said the lethal weapons were discovered on Wednesday at about 4:30pm following a tip-off.

Spread of Boko Haram Threatens Heart of Nigerian Economy

LAGOS, Nigeria—To understand why Africa's top economy is faltering after five years of Islamist attacks, take a look at Tochukwu Odidigwe's car-parts dealership.

In June, an explosion tore through a traffic jam near his storefront near the port of Lagos, the country's commercial hub. The deadly blast left his street covered in ash and his customers scared to come back. "They are afraid they may be killed," said Mr. Odidigwe.

Boko Haram Bent On Seizing Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Kogi And Nasarawa States - Intelligence Source

A high-level Nigerian security source told SaharaReporters that Nigeria’s intelligence agencies have received “credible reports that Boko Haram has
developed an ambitious plan to overwhelm and take over Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Kogi and Nasarawa states.”

The source said the Islamist terrorist group plans to carry out its design by intensifying its bombings and choosing locations that would yield high casualty
figures.

“Their move is to encircle [Nigeria’s capital city of] Abuja and increase the level of political instability in the
country,” our source revealed.
The high-level intelligence agent disclosed that the shape of the terror group’s plans have emerged from
the confessions of some Boko Haram insurgents who were captured recently.

“We have also acquired a lot of
information about their [Boko Haram’s] plans through our interrogation of Aminu Sadiq Oguche.” Mr. Oguche,
who was recently extradited to Nigeria from Sudan, is accused of masterminding some of the recent high-
profile bomb blasts in Nigeria, including explosions at a bus station in Abuja that claimed more than 100 lives.

In addition, security agents have gleaned “significant and useful intelligence” from interrogating one
Mohammed Zakari, described as “the chief butcher” of Boko Haram. Mr. Zakari was recently arrested in Bauchi, capital of Bauchi State.

Our source said that Nigeria’s security agencies are stepping up counter-insurgency measures to forestall Boko Haram’s plans to spread its tentacles to the states they are targeting.

“Apart from information we have gathered from interrogating suspects, we are also tracking critical
conversations by the group’s hierarchy and examining sensitive documents recovered after recent raids on their bases in Bauchi, Jigawa and Borno states,” the source said.

Our source added that President Goodluck Jonathan and a few other government officials had been briefed
about the new threats by Boko Haram as well as the outline of the plans to counter the group’s ambitious push.

A senior Islamic scholar in Northern Nigeria, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said his group was
cooperating with the government to defeat Boko Haram. “We discussed with President Jonathan when we met during the end of the Ramadan fast and told him that we are ready to help stop Boko Haram. But we also told him that this is something the government must take action on. We’re doing our own, but we have limitations,” he said.

SR

How Europe Inadvertently Bankrolls Al-Qaeda, Al-Shabab

Al-Qaeda is increasingly funding terror
operations thanks to at least $125 million in ransom paid since 2008, largely by European governments to free western hostages, The New York Times reported.

The payments totaled $66 million in 2013 alone, according to an investigation by the newspaper
published Tuesday.
While Al-Qaeda's network was first funded by wealthy donors, "kidnapping for ransom has become today’s most significant source of terrorist financing," said David S. Cohen, the Treasury Department’s under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, in a 2012 speech.

"Each transaction encourages another transaction." The organization has openly acknowledged the windfall, the paper reported.
"Kidnapping hostages is an easy spoil," wrote Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, "which I may describe as a profitable trade and a precious treasure."
Al-Wuhayshi said ransom money — reaching around $10 million per hostage in recent cases— accounts for up to half his operating budget.
The paper listed more than $90 million paid to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb since 2008 — by a Switzerland, Spain, Austria, and state-controlled French company and two payments from undetermined sources.

Somalia's Al-Shabab insurgents received $5.1 million from Spain, while Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula received nearly $30 million in two payments, one from Qatar and Oman, the other of undetermined origin.

Austria, France, Germany, Italy, and
Switzerland each denied ever paying ransoms for hostages. French nuclear company Areva also denied paying ransom.

However, last year a former senior French intelligence official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity: "Governments and companies pay in almost every case."
"There is always a ransom or an exchange of some sort: money, the release of prisoners, arms deliveries."

The Times article cited former hostages, negotiators, diplomats and government officials in 10 countries in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, and it said the payments were sometimes hidden as development aid.

The U.S. and Britain have notably refused to pay to free kidnapped nationals, the paper reported, with the result that just a few have been
rescued in military raids or escaped.

However, the U.S. has been willing to negotiate in some cases, including the recent trade of five senior Taliban prisoners held at Guantanamo in
exchange for captured U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl.

"The Europeans have a lot to answer for," Vicki Huddleston, the former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for African affairs, who was the ambassador to Mali in 2003 when Germany paid the first ransom, told The Times.
"They pay ransoms and then deny any was paid," arguing the policy "makes all of our citizens vulnerable."

G8 leaders last year signed a deal to
"unequivocally reject the payment of ransoms to terrorists" but did not impose a formal ban.

Business Insider

Boko Haram: Nigeria Opens Long-Awaited Battle of Ideas Against Sect's Ideology

KADUNA, Nigeria (Reuters) - In classrooms facing a sandy courtyard in the northern Nigerian city of Kaduna, Maska Road Islamic School teaches a creed that condemns the violent ideology of groups like Boko Haram.
Not everyone has got its message. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, known as the "Pants Bomber", spent his youth in this school - and ended up trying unsuccessfully to blow up a U.S. airliner on Christmas Day 2009 with explosives hidden in his underwear.

But the school is steadfast in preaching tolerance to its pupils, and the government is about to adopt this
message in a new strategy for containing Boko Haram, which has killed thousands in a five-year campaign for an Islamic state.
"We teach them that what they (Boko Haram) are doing is a total misunderstanding of the Islamic religion, that Prophet Mohammed was compassionate, he even lived together with the non-Muslims in Medina," said headmaster Sulaiman Saiki.
"We teach them tolerance," he told Reuters as girls in the next room softly recited Koranic verses in Arabic
melodies.

Abdulmutallab was radicalised in an Al Qaeda camp in Yemen, but his case shows that even youths given a
relatively liberal Muslim education can be seduced by radical Islam. This is something the new government program is aiming to combat.
Koranic schools like Maska Road will be a pillar of the strategy being launched in September to counter Boko Haram's ideology. The aim is to win over the "hearts and minds" of young Nigerians.
They will also challenge Boko Haram's claim that secular teaching is "un-Islamic" - Boko Haram means
"Western education is sinful" in Hausa, the dominant language in Nigeria's mainly Muslim north.

Maska Road teaches only Koranic verses and other tenets of Muslim faith, and encourages its 300 students to take classes such as science and literature outside its walls.
"We want them to get a Western education and combine it with ... religious learning," Saiki says.

Classes are held between 4 and 6 p.m., after secular schools shut.
Fatah Abdul, who studies at Maska Road, scoffs at the idea of violence in the name of Islam.
"Our religion doesn't entertain killing. Boko Haram is absolutely different from what our religion advocates,"
she said. "And it's not true what they say that we need an Islamic state. The leadership doesn't have to be Islamic".

"DECEIVED"
Saiki was a neighbor of Abdulmutallab when the future Pants Bomber was at school. He says Abdulmutallab didn't learn to hate the West there but "was deceived afterwards".
Abdulmutallab, a loner from a well-to-do northern family, showed how easily youths can be radicalised.

Add poverty into the mix, as in Nigeria's troubled northeastern Borno state, and it's not hard to see how Boko Haram finds young recruits.
Boko Haram is suspected of being behind suicide bombings that killed 82 people in Kaduna last week,
including one against a Muslim cleric about to lead a public prayer.

Kaduna, the capital of the north in colonial times, is richer than anywhere in the northeastern region where Boko Haram is based. But it shares many of its problems such as high youth unemployment, attested by the many children begging and hawking phone credit on its rubbish-filled streets.

President Goodluck Jonathan's administration has been pilloried for its apparent powerlessness to crush the rebels or protect civilians, including more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped in April and who remain in captivity. But he has also faced censure for neglecting the insurgency's underlying causes.

So when Jonathan's National Security Adviser (NSA) Sambo Dasuki announced a new "soft approach to terrorism" in March, many instantly dismissed it as lacking in substance.
But officials in the office of the NSA say imams in mosques and traditional elders will be co-opted to preach tolerance, while measures will be taken to ensure Koranic schools teach "correct" interpretations of sacred texts.

The drive will also include educational programs, especially increased sports and music in northern schools, plus reform programs for convicted Boko
Haram detainees.
"A lot them don't have much Islamic knowledge, so they tend to believe what the mullahs say," Fatima Akilu, director of behavioral analysis in the office of the NSA told Reuters. "We want to teach what the Koran actually says in a language they understand."

A parallel economic program, also funded by the NSA's budget, will address the chronic poverty seen as a major driver of the insurgency.

It may be too late to bring back hundreds of youths already fighting for Boko Haram, but the idea is to prevent more from joining. Northern Nigeria has much lower levels of education than the south, a legacy of British colonialism, which protected the caliphates of the north from the activity of Christian missionaries who set up many schools in the south.

"The aspects of education Boko Haram don't like are the ones that allow you to think," Akilu said. "Keep people in the dark and you can control them with a singular narrative."
Undoing this partly involves showing how "Western" ideas, such as mathematics and some physics and
astronomy, are rooted in mediaeval Islamic thought, which was making strides while Christians in Europe
were busy burning witches.

"UN-ISLAMIC"
At the Sultan Bello mosque in Kaduna's busy downtown market area, local imam Ahmed Gumi takes an unusual step to illustrate his openness to the non-Islamic world: he invites four Reuters journalists in to see, film and photograph his sermon.
Three are non-Muslim, including two Westerners. He introduces the team to his congregation of about 350
packed into a main hall, and after a chorus of "welcome" he offers a live interview about his views on Boko Haram in front of the faithful.
"It's not right to call what those boys are doing Islamic," he later told Reuters privately. "They hide
behind Islam."

Gumi, one of northern Nigeria's most popular clerics, sees the idea of an Islamic state dear to extremists as
a throwback.
"They want to bring back the golden age of Islamic triumph in this modern time." he says. "For a state to survive you need a strong civilization, education, money, lawyers, doctors. You don't create a civilization with AK-47s in the bush."
He knows his outspoken views carry a risk he'll be targeted by Boko Haram. His mosque, a towering structure spread between four sand-colored turrets with turquoise-green domes, is guarded by scores of unarmed volunteers checking cars and bags.

Boko Haram fighters have killed dozens of clerics. One of the targets of the Kaduna bombs was a Sheikh Dahiru Bauchi, an imam whose mystical Sufism is a far cry from the austere al Qaeda-style type of Islam. Bauchi survived.

Though a government critic, Gumi approves of the soft approach, "but it needs local Borno (leaders) more than
people like us who are already openly opposed to them".

"ROOT CAUSES"
Taking issue with Boko Haram's ideology will work only if the government can draw disaffected youths away from the AK-47. The NSA's economic program aims to do this, starting with 2 billion naira ($12.3 million), but with a further 60 billion that can be made available from other agencies for projects, said Soji Adelaja, NSA special adviser on economic intelligence.

They include mobile medical trucks, cash for the orphans and widows of Boko Haram's victims, and a program employing 150,000 youths to fix roads and rebuild police stations.

Parts of Nigeria that are completely besieged by the insurgents are off-limits, but there are other vulnerable areas where the program can be rolled out, Adelaja says. "We are deploying in areas that are safe, and where the community has some resilience against Boko Haram."

The death of Boko Haram's founder Mohammed Yusuf in police custody transformed what had been a clerical
movement into an armed rebellion in 2009. Akilu says Yusuf disliked "Western" science which he saw as
contradicting the Koran, especially evolutionary theory, the fact that the world is round and the process of
evaporation, because "rain is a gift from God".

Getting schools to show how science and religion can co-exist, she says, is essential to combating such ideas.
Down a dirt track with crater-like potholes on the outskirts of Kaduna lies the iron-roofed Focus 1,2,3
International School. Twelve classrooms packed with desks take 25 children each.

Secular education is between 7.30 a.m. and midday. After lunch, Islamic schooling is between 1 p.m. and 5.30 p.m.
Muhammad Saleh, who runs the school, believes strongly in science, although he has doubts about evolutionary theory - as do many conservative Christians in the West.
Even so, his school teaches it. "I teach them evolution myself, and the parents never complain," he told Reuters. "It's education. Once children have an education they can decide for themselves what to think."

Reuters