http://www.cfr.org/africa/boko-haram/p25739
Boko Haram
Author: Toni Johnson, Senior Staff Writer
August 31, 2011
* Introduction
* Birth of Boko Haram
* Rising Against the State
* The North-South Divide
* Terror Ties and Policy Prescriptions
Introduction
Boko Haram, an Islamist religious sect, has targeted Nigeria's police,
rival clerics, politicians, and public institutions with increasing
violence since 2009. Some experts say the group should primarily be
seen as leading an armed revolt against the government's entrenched
corruption, abusive security forces, strife between the disaffected
Muslim north and Christian south, and widening regional economic
disparity in an already impoverished country. They argue that Abuja
should do more to address the issues facing the disaffected Muslim
north. But Boko Haram's suspected bombing of a UN building in Abuja in
August 2011 and its ties to regional terror groups may signal a new
trajectory and spark a stronger international response that makes it
harder to address the north's alienation.
Birth of Boko Haram
Mohammad Yusuf, a radical Islamist cleric, created Boko Haram in 2002
in Maiduguri, the capital of the northeastern state of Borno. The
group aims to establish a fully Islamic state in Nigeria, including
the implementation of criminal sharia courts across the country. Paul
Lubeck, a University of California professor studying Muslim societies
in Africa, says Yusuf was a trained salafist (CSMonitor) (a school of
thought often associated with jihad), and was strongly influenced by
Ibn Taymiyyah, a fourteenth century legal scholar who preached Islamic
fundamentalism and is considered a "major theorist" for radical groups
in the Middle East.
Boko Haram colloquially translates into "Western education is sin,"
which experts say is a name assigned by the state. The sect calls
itself Jama'atul Alhul Sunnah Lidda'wati wal jihad, or "people
committed to the propagation of the prophet's teachings and jihad."
Some analysts say the movement is an outgrowth of the Maitatsine riots
of the 1980s (AfricaToday) and the religious/ethnic tensions that
followed in the late 1990s. Many Nigerians believe Yusuf rejected all
things Western, but Lubeck argues that Yusuf, who embraced technology,
believed Western education should be "mediated through Islamic
scholarship," such as rejecting the theory of evolution and Western-
style banking.
Before 2009, the group did not aim to violently overthrow the
government. Yusuf criticized northern Muslims for participating in
what he saw as an illegitimate, non-Islamic state and preached a
doctrine of withdrawal. But violence between Christians and Muslims
(al-Jazeera) and harsh government treatment, including pervasive
police brutality, encouraged the group's radicalization. Human Rights
Watch researcher Eric Guttschuss told news service IRIN that Yusuf
gained supporters "by speaking out against police and political
corruption." Boko Haram followers, also called Yusuffiya, consist
largely of hundreds of impoverished northern Islamic students and
clerics as well as university students and professionals, many of whom
are unemployed. Some followers may also be members of Nigeria's elite.
In July 2009, Boko Haram members refused to follow a motor-bike helmet
law, leading to heavy-handed police tactics that set off an armed
uprising in the northern state of Bauchi and spread into the states of
Borno, Yobe, and Kano. The incident was suppressed by the army and
left more than eight hundred dead. It also led to the televised
execution of Yusuf, as well as the deaths of his father in-law and
other sect members, which human rights advocates consider to be extra-
judicial killings. In the aftermath of the 2009 unrest, "an Islamist
insurrection under a splintered leadership" emerged, says Lubeck. Boko
Haram began to carry out a number of suicide bombings and
assassinations from Maiduguri to Abuja, and staged an ambitious prison-
break in Bauchi, freeing more than seven hundred inmates in 2010.
Rising Against the State
CFR Senior Fellow John Campbell notes that "the context of Boko Haram
is easier to talk about than Boko Haram itself." Injustice and
poverty, as well as the belief that the West is a corrupting influence
in governance, are root causes of both the desire to implement sharia
and Boko Haram's pursuit of an Islamic state, say experts. "The
emergence of Boko Haram signifies the maturation of long festering
extremist impulses that run deep in the social reality of northern
Nigeria," writes Nigerian analyst Chris Ngwodo. "But the group itself
is an effect and not a cause; it is a symptom of decades of failed
government and elite delinquency finally ripening into social chaos."
The reintroduction of sharia criminal courts was originally proposed
by the governor of the state of Zamfara in 1999, but the proposal
quickly became a grassroots movement that led to its adoption in
twelve states. Experts say there was widespread "disillusionment" with
the way sharia was implemented, and that Boko Haram has tapped into
this dissatisfaction, promoting the idea that an Islamic state would
eliminate the inconsistencies. "You punish somebody for stealing a
goat or less--but a governor steals billions of naira, and gets off
scott-free," says Jean Herskovits, an expert on Nigerian politics.
Injustice and poverty, as well as the belief that the West is a
corrupting influence in governance, are root causes of both the desire
to implement sharia and Boko Haram's pursuit of an Islamic state, say
experts.
In an August 2011 report, Human Rights Watch notes "corruption is so
pervasive in Nigeria that it has turned public service for many into a
kind of criminal enterprise. Graft has fueled political violence,
denied millions of Nigerians access to even the most basic health and
education services, and reinforced police abuses and other widespread
patterns of human rights violations."
An Amnesty International report (PDF) points out that the Nigerian
police force is responsible for hundreds of extra-judicial killings
and disappearances each year across the country that largely "go
uninvestigated and unpunished." Human rights advocates note that the
public executions of Boko Haram followers by security forces,
including the ones documented by this video (al-Jazeera), have yet to
produce a conviction. However, the government began in July 2011 to
try five police officers connected to Yusuf's killing and in August
2011 began the court martial of a military commander (DailyTrust)
responsible for troops that killed forty-two sect members during the
July 2009 uprising.
The North-South Divide
Nigeria is Africa's most populous country, with more than 150 million
people and nearly 350 ethnic groups speaking 250 languages. The
country is about 50 percent Muslim, 40 percent Christian, and 10
percent indigenous sects. The country has long grappled with how to
govern a diverse nation in which religion is one of the most important
features of identity. Some experts argue that the ongoing struggle
between Christians and Muslims over political power is a significant
factor in the country's ongoing unrest. This sectarian violence,
particularly in the central part of the country where the north and
south collide, has killed more than 14,000 people since 1999,
according to Human Rights Watch.
Others note that Boko Haram has killed more Muslims than Christians.
"In a country with a history of polarization between the majority-
Muslim north and the majority-Christian south, Boko Haram's message is
a polarizing one at the national level and within the Muslim
community," write Alex Thurston in Foreign Policy. Experts also note
that though the northern unrest has been portrayed in a context of
extreme religiosity, religious extremism is evident throughout
Nigeria.
Despite a per capita income of more than $2,700 and annual GDP growth
of 7 percent, Nigeria has one of the world's poorest populations. An
estimated 70 percent of the population lives on less than $1.25 a day.
Economic disparities between the north and the rest of the country are
particularly stark. In the north, 72 percent of people live in poverty
compared to 27 percent in the south and 35 percent in the Niger Delta.
"An analysis of public investments in infrastructure and human capital
in the northeast would explain why the region is not only home to
flawed elections and economic hopelessness but the Boko Haram
insurgency as well," writes former Nigerian federal minister Nasir
Ahmad El-Rufai. "Indeed, most of the apparent ethnic and religious
crises in the North, and the youth violence and criminality in the
south, can be linked to increasing economic inequality."
Another crucial factor in economic inequality is oil. In the book
Nigeria: Dancing on the Brink, Campbell writes that the "formal
politics" of northern Nigeria is "overwhelmingly dominated by Muslim
elites, who have, like their counterparts across the country,
benefited from oil wealth at the expense of regional development." He
said in an interview with CFR.org that the central purpose of the
Nigerian state is to divide up the country's oil wealth among elites,
making Nigeria's politics a "zero sum game." In the oil-producing
delta, for example, groups such as MEND (BBC) (Movement for the
Emancipation of the Niger Delta)--which has attacked oil
infrastructure--are largely an outgrowth of the feeling that the south
should get more revenue than it already does.
Although these elites still have access to oil wealth, northern
Nigerians fear their political influence in the country is waning.
"The Nigerian voices heard most loudly around the world, and in
Nigeria itself, are Christian and secular, reinforcing the sense among
Nigeria's Muslims that they are invisible," G. Pascal Zachary writes
in the Atlantic.
The dispute over 2011 election results, which led to over eight
hundred dead, also has played a role in Boko Haram's escalating
violence. Experts say many northern Nigerians view the presidency of
Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, as illegitimate, arguing that he
ignored an informal power-rotation agreement that should have kept a
Muslim as president this round. (Muslim President Umar Musa Yar'dua
died in 2010, two years into his four-year term.) Voting
irregularities during the election as well as efforts to change
presidential term limits further alienated the north from Jonathan.
Some Jonathan supporters argue Boko Harm's attacks are an attempt,
possibly funded by northern elites, to make the country ungovernable
(TheNation).
Terror Ties and Policy Prescriptions
Experts say the prison-break, use of propaganda, and the bombing of
police headquarters in June 2011 indicated an increasing level of
sophistication and organization, which could point to outside help. In
August 2011, U.S. officials claimed the group has ties to al-Qaeda in
the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), which operates in northwest Africa, and
Somalia's al-Shabaab, another militant Islamist group.
Security officials in Nigeria and internationally are concerned that
the group has splintered into one that is focused on local grievances
and another that is seeking contacts with outside terror groups (WSJ).
"What is most worrying at present is, at least in my view, a clearly
stated intent by Boko Haram and by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb to
coordinate and synchronize (AP) their efforts," said General Carter
Ham, head of U.S. military operations in Africa, noting that such a
relationship would be "the most dangerous thing to happen" to Africans
and to U.S. interests in the region. A 2011 State Department report
observes the Nigerian National Police Force has limited capacity to
conduct anti-terror operations.
Other experts, such as Lubeck and CFR's Campbell, question the extent
of the sect's regional terror ties and say it is unclear which attacks
are actually the work of Boko Haram. There is concern that some of the
acts may be the work of criminals looking to capitalize on the mayhem
(some of the targets supposedly attacked by Boko Haram have been
banks, for instance) or perpetrated by other groups hostile to the
state. They also argue the group has a legitimate grievance against
the country's security forces and that international intervention
could distract from policy actions needed to address the underlying
issues.
Before the UN bombing in August 2011, the Nigerian government started
to look at solutions similar to its quelling of unrest in the Niger
Delta, including negotiation and amnesty. MEND leaders were "bought
off" by the government and accepted a ceasefire in 2010. But experts
say such a solution is unlikely for a group like Boko Haram. "The
grievances Boko Haram expresses are more diverse, less material, and
are explicitly articulated as religious politics," writes Thurston in
his blog.
Analyst Chris Ngwodo argues some kind of federal intervention may be
needed, especially in education and healthcare, and greater pressure
may need to be exerted on northern elites to develop the region. CFR's
Campbell argues that President Jonathan needs gestures, such as naming
prominent northern Muslims to his cabinet, to address northern
disaffection.
He and other experts also are particularly concerned about the
improving economic opportunity in the region, including greater
foreign investment, improving infrastructure, and expanding access to
Western-style education. "The problem in Nigeria is the government
must create the conditions and the incentives, both political and
economic, for the people with wealth to invest locally to generate
employment," Lubeck argues.
Britain and Israel have already offered anti-terror assistance, and
the U.S. military recently discussed sharing intelligence and
potentially training Nigerian security forces (Leadership). Human
rights and diplomatic officials note that Nigeria's heavy-handed
military approach (NYT) is compounding their security problem.
Campbell warns against too much U.S. involvement on the anti-terror
front. "If the United States becomes associated with Abuja's
oppression, then we and the international community become fair game,"
he says, noting that the UN bombing indicates that it is possible this
has already happened.
Weigh in on this issue by emailing CFR.org.
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin.
For current archives, visit http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
For previous archives, visit http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue-
unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
No comments:
Post a Comment