Sunday, June 19, 2011

The matter of Boko Haram

Note: The following 26 articles offer a chronological unfolding of events leading to the shocking twin bomb attack on the police headquarters Thursday in Abuja, claimed by Boko Haram.  To find Niger Delta and other Nigerian news, scroll through "older posts."   

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13 June 2011

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Yet again, there is confusion around how exactly the government intends to discharge its function to secure the lives of its citizens.

One day, the issue is insecurity of youth corps members; another day, it is sectarian violence driven by ethnicity, religion, politics, or any mix of the three; or Niger Delta militants gone amuck, alternating between being seen as terrorists and as guests of the government; and now it is Boko Haram, the religious sect terrorising Nigerians in Bauchi, Borno and Plateau States, opposed as it is to Western education and influence.

In February, the police inspector-general essentially threw his hands up in the air in exasperation, calling the Boko Haram crises a "challenge to the police and other security agencies" and attacking the issue with the provision of vehicles and motorcycles. Barely hours after, another police officer was killed in Borno State's Biu, and then another in Maiduguri.

Suffice it to say that the men of Boko Haram are still a major threat to many states in the north; murdering and making whole towns ungovernable - and then linked to the bomb attacks that ensued on the night of our new president's inauguration.

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