Hundreds of Boko Haram militants were
killed by local vigilantes and Nigerian soldiers Sunday after the
Islamist militant group launched its second failed assault on the
northeastern city of Maiduguri in the space of a week.
The group’s fighters reportedly incurred “massive
casualties” in the early-morning offensive when they rode into the Borno
State capital in tanks, pickup trucks and motorbikes, according to
defence ministry spokesman, Chris Olukolade.
Following their failed attempt to capture Maiduguri last week, the radical Islamists regrouped and encircled the city of two million in order to launch their next attack but were met by similar resistance.
Boko Haram’s entry into the city - via the southern road
leading to the town of Damboa - was stifled by local vigilantes and the
Nigerian army, who killed hundreds of the group’s members and forced
many into the surrounding Sambisa Forest. The militants then regrouped
and attempted to attack the city from the east but failed again when met
by Nigerian forces.
After the attack, a Nigerian army spokesman Col. Tukur
Ismail Gusau, told local Nigerian media: “The security situation in
Maiduguri is now under our control. Our troops are pursuing them [Boko
Haram] back into the forest.”
Analysts believe that the reason the group launched these
two large-scale offensives within such a short space of time was because
of the pressure Boko Haram is under from a renewed “military surge” by
regional powers such as Cameroon and Chad. These two countries have
started conducting airstrikes and ground operations against a number of
towns the group controls along the shared Nigerian-Cameroonian border.
“What is really noteworthy is the fact that they put a lot
into this attack and the previous one. They mobilised considerable
resources - this isn’t a small skirmish,” says Imad Mesdoua, political
analyst at Africa-focused political risk consultancy Africa Matters.
“There is implicitly this wish to project an image of a group that is
omnipresent and that is still alive and kicking.”
“There might also be an element of Boko Haram trying to
counter in the face of a recent Nigerian-Chad military surge,” he adds.
“The sudden Nigerian-Chadian-Cameroonian military push in these border
towns gives them [Boko Haram] more incentive to attack inward cities as
important as Maiduguri.”
Despite Nigeria boasting Africa’s largest military, the
threat the group poses to wider West African security has forced
countries neighbouring Nigeria into a regional ‘coalition of the
willing’.
At the African Union (AU) summit in the Ethiopian capital
Addis Ababa last week, Nigeria and its neighbours - Benin, Cameroon,
Chad and Niger - agreed that a Multinational Joint Task Force [MJTF] of
7,500 troops will be created to tackle the radical Islamist group.
“Boko Haram’s horrendous abuses, unspeakable cruelty, total
disregard for human lives, and wanton destruction of property are
unmatched,” said the chairwoman of AU, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
“No efforts should be spared, as part of the AU
counterterrorism agenda, to defeat this group,” she added. The details
of the MJTF will be ironed out at a meeting of the regional powers in
the Cameroonian capital, Yaoundé, on 5th-7th February.
Discussing the AU task force’s prospects in the battle
against Boko Haram, Mesdoua says that “political support” and “military
coordination” will be key to its success on the battlefield.
“If you have those two things, alongside the numbers that
are suggested, I don’t see why the force would not be effective against
Boko Haram,” he asserted
In light of the security threat posed by the group in the
northeastern regions of Borno and Yobe - which both remain under a state
of emergency - leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) political
party Muhammadu Buhari, cancelled his trip to the embattled city of
Maiduguri today. Incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan’s People’s
Democratic Party (PDP) also cancelled a rally to be held today in Yobe
State capital, Damaturu.
The Council on Foreign Relations’ Nigeria Security Tracker
estimates that the terror group have killed up to 10,404 people since
January 2014. In its four-year-long insurgency, which seeks to create an
Islamic caliphate in similar vein to that of the Islamic State, the
group have captured territory equal to the size of Belgium.
Source:
Newsweek
2 comments:
This is wonderful news. Let us hope that the army and the local militia don't become over confident. The job won't truly be done unless all of these fighters have been eradicated. Leaving a remnant of the Boko Haram fighting force intact will come back to haunt us in the future. The only cure for the cancer which has afflicted the country since perhap 2005 is total eradication of every Boko Haram insurgent. Then Nigeria will be safe from them.
i Mr. Adela,
I agree with you. It will do a lot of good if Nigerian troops are on the offensive rather than defensive. Our troops must dictate the pace of events, take the battle to Boko Haram. A penchant for repelling attacks is detrimental.
Cheers
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