Nigeria: Boko Haram Now Targeting Men

By Staff Writer

Islamist insurgents, Boko Haram have taken to killing men in a ploy to assert their control by seizing another region in northern Nigeria, on Thursday September 4.

The outfit began house-to-house sweeps in and around Bama town, 70km from the Borno state capital, Maiduguri where heavy fighting between Boko Haram fighters and government soldiers is ongoing, forcing civilians to flee for their safety.

Displaced residents said the insurgents captured and killed men suspected of being members of a civilian vigilante group that had resisted its take-over.

"Everyone is their target as long as you are a male", said Senator Ahmed Zannah, who represents the central part of Borno State in the National Assembly.

At least 180 people have been killed with the National Emergency Management Agency registered 26 391 refugees displaced from Bama area in the past one week.

Heavily armed Boko Haram fighters have also captured several towns in the Gulani area of neighbouring Yobe State, seizing the council secretariat and the local government lodge in Bara.

"The whole of my local government has been taken over", said State House of Assembly representative Abdullahi Kukuwa.

The group has been gathering large crowds to preach Islamic shariah law, Kukuwa said.

The fighting follows a meeting by foreign ministers from Nigeria and neighbouring countries on Wednesday September 3 to discuss Boko Haram’s intensified land grabbing in the northeast, raising concerns about regional security.

The one-day meeting of representatives from Benin, Cameroon, Chad and Niger also included officials from the United States, Britain, France and Canada plus the African Union and United Nations.

Nigeria's ministry of foreign affairs said the talks were aimed at "reviewing progress" of earlier meetings in Paris and London as well as the Africa Summit held in the United States in August.

Boko Haram militia gained global notoriety after the Islamists mass kidnapping of more than 200 girls from their school in northeast Nigeria in April.

International powers sent intelligence and surveillance specialists and equipment to Abuja to help trace the missing teenagers, 217 of whom are still being held captive.

But nearly five months on from the abduction, Western diplomats have indicated that there has been little progress, despite a claim from Nigeria's military that they had located the girls.

In August, Boko Haram declared a caliphate in the town of Gwoza, roughly 50km south of Bama.

Boko Haram, which means "Western education is sinful", has killed more than 3 000 people in the north of the country this year alone.

When it first launched attacks in 2009, Boko Haram mainly targeted Christians under the pretext of wanting to establish an Islamic state.

But since mid-2013, the group has focused its attacks on government security agents as well as on civilians of both Christian and Muslim faiths in their homes, markets, hospitals and schools.

Andrew Noakes, co-coordinator of the Nigeria Security Network of analysts, warned that the government was losing control of vast parts of the northeast and a looming humanitarian crisis.

"Unless swift action is taken, Nigeria could be facing a rapid takeover of a large area of its territory reminiscent of ISIS's lightning advances in Iraq," he said.

Nigeria has repeatedly played up what it says is the regional aspect of the insurgency, blaming foreign fighters and overseas funding for the violence.

But while some foreign mercenaries may form part of the guerrilla ranks and violence has spilt across borders, some analysts say a wider military response risked internationalizing the conflict.