Boko Haram has lost significant ground in northern Nigeria, according to some of the region’s top officials and international security experts, dealing a setback to a group that for years has menaced the nation with murder, abductions and other violence.
However, while officials say Boko Haram’s capacity to seize and hold entire towns is weakened, the group is still carrying out suicide bombings and other targeted attacks throughout the region, a staple of the militants’ strategy for years.
Some Nigerian officials said the military push into what once had been Boko Haram’s strongholds in Nigeria had forced the group to scatter, leaving it to carry out attacks on markets and other public places rather than seizing large numbers of people and territory.
“Now the fight is everywhere, so they are on the run,” said Hussaini Monguno, security adviser to Borno State Governor Kashim Shettima.
In recent weeks, Nigeria has committed to a renewed push to root out Boko Haram, a top mandate of new President Muhammadu Buhari, who has set a deadline of the end of the year to finish off the group.
His country has been working with Chad, Niger and Cameroon, which continue to endure deadly attacks.
Late last week, the Nigerian army said it had cleared out several Boko Haram encampments, freeing 60 captives and seizing a hoard of bomb-making materials, among other accomplishments.
“Let me tell you, Boko Haram is terribly losing ground and very soon we are going to defeat them,” Colonel Sani Kukasheka Usman, an army spokesman, said in an interview. “They have been seriously degraded and rooted out and now they are on their own.”
While military brass has been known to exaggerate gains made against Boko Haram, some local officials were also upbeat about the recent military action.
“Boko Haram seems to be disorganized now; it is good news,” said Isa Gusau, another aide to Shettima in Borno. “They might be in control of some villages at the moment, but it’s nothing compared to what it used to be in the past.”
Gusau said the group’s strikes outside Nigeria were evidence of its desperation.
“They are gaining publicity,” he said, “not ground.”
Last week in Niger, five people were killed as Boko Haram attacked a village in the Bosso district. The episode follows a recent bombing just across the Nigerian border with Cameroon, where teenage female suicide bombers killed three people.
Chadian Minister for Foreign Affairs Moussa Faki Mahamat said the recent violence proved that military efforts against Boko Haram had forced it to change tactics.
“A few months ago, this group took the towns,” he said in an interview with the regional magazine Jeune Afrique. “It changed procedure because it no longer has the same means.”
Dimouya Souapabe, a government official from the Lake Chad region, said he could not be certain that the Nigerian military’s actions were the driving force behind the new attacks outside Nigeria.
“As you know, parts of Chad are difficult to access,” Souapabe said. “Some elements of Boko Haram have a mastery of this region, and neither the Nigerian military or the Chadian army has a mastery of these parts of Lake Chad.”
Some Boko Haram experts said the recent cheerleading for the advances against Boko Haram could be wishful thinking by officials who were overly optimistic about Buhari’s new administration and the tough public stand he has taken against Boko Haram.
“The problem isn’t armed troops fighting and chasing Boko Haram out of the district,” said Paul Lubeck, director of African studies at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. “The problem is whether they can set up an administration with security to hold them off.”
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