Boko Haram

[Jibrin Ibrahim]

Boko Haram is Exhausting: Please Obliterate Them

Jibrin Ibrahim, Deepening Democracy Column, Daily Trust, 20th March 2026

I am tired of writing about Boko Haram. It is mentally exhausting to
be chronicling death, destruction and despair for over two decades.
The Boko Haram narrative started with its founding in 2002 (some say
earlier, others say later) in Maiduguri, Nigeria, by a cleric,
Mohammed Yusuf. Originally, the group appeared with a noble objective
to "purify" Islam and oppose Western culture, education and influence.
It started as a non-violent group focused on proselytization but then
started engaging in violent acts. The government of the day, led by
President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, was not ready to accept violent groups
and ordered that they be obliterated and they were wiped out.

Their leader, Mohammed Yusuf was martyred by the Nigerian Police after
the military had handed him over to them for prosecution and the story
of the insurgency started. A clear objective emerged after they
regrouped and returned to the terrain, the creation of an Islamic
state in Nigeria. Following the assassination of their founder in
2009, the group, under Abubakar Shekau, became increasingly violent,
adopting terrorist tactics, including suicide bombings, starting with
attacks in 2011, such as the Abuja police headquarters bombing. By
2014, they had declared an Islamic Caliphate, controlled about 17
local governments in Nigeria and had a headquarters. It became clear
they had to be destroyed, nay, annihilated and obliterated. The
exhausting struggle for annihilation continued under Yar’Adua,
Jonathan, Buhari and now Tinubu. No light at the end of the tunnel.

Last week, I mentioned in my column that Boko Haram had been attacking
military formations and gradually encircling Maiduguri. They responded
yes and sent three bomb blasts into the city on 16th March. At least
23 people were killed and over a hundred wounded. I guess it had
become such a routine type of mass killing that the President did not
even flinch and travelled on to London for his programmed State Visit
to the United Kingdom where he received a 42 rather than the normal 21
Gun Salute. Sign.

Meanwhile for Maiduguri, which had suffered the repeated tragedies of
bomb blasts spread over the past decade, fear was back in the streets
and on people’s faces. The tragedy continues. The Maiduguri explosions
came barely 24 hours after terrorists attacked a military base in
Kofa, a community close to Ajilari on the outskirts of Maiduguri.
Before then, there had been attacks by terror groups across Borno
State, including assaults on rural military bases and resettled
communities like Ngoshe and Dalwa as reported by HumAngle. The
depressing stories are endless.

There is a standard response to such tragedies by the Nigerian
government. Enroute to the United Kingdom, the President ordered the
Service Chiefs to relocate to Maiduguri and resolve the security
crisis. In the past, they have been so ordered numerous times, they
had moved to the epi-centre of the security crisis and nothing had
been solved. I have never understood the significance of the movement.
For months, the terrorists have been attacking military bases in Borno
and Yobe States and my civilian thinking was that the military would
be so angry that they would hunt down all the terrorists and
obliterate them for daring to confront one of Africa’s greatest
military. It did not happen.

Way back in 2014, the Nigerian government recruited foreign
mercenaries to combat and obliterate Boko Haram. I was very uneasy
about the significance of the policy shift. It meant that the
government itself no longer believed our armed forces were up to the
task. I wondered them whether terrorism will end in my lifetime.
Eventually the contract with the foreign military contractor was
cancelled and full confidence was reported in the armed forces. They
improved their work and all the local government areas taken over by
the terrorists were recaptured and it appeared light could be seen at
the end of the tunnel. Since then, Boko Haram fighters have spent a
lot of energy fighting and killing themselves. I thought that was a
great opportunity to move in for the kill. That did not happen. Boko
Haram now split into different organisations have been recovering and
fully returned to their battle against the Nigerian people and the
Nigerian State. Terrorism never really subsided, it simply stopped
capturing and keeping territory. It raided, looted, raped, killed,
taxed and moved on.

As a country, we have not really been able to directly pose the
existential question of why our armed forces have been unable to smash
and obliterate terrorism. The Nigerian army, it appears to me, has not
changed substantially from the one bequeathed by British colonialism.
It has clearly shown its limits in combating terrorists who are mobile
and manoeuvrable like the Boko Harams and the bandit terrorists. Our
intelligence services have grown and multiplied since the creation of
the Nigerian Security Organisation (NSO) by Gen Obasanjo in 1976. It
was replaced by a multiplicity of organisations such as DSS, NIA and
DMI. We are however yet to see the type of efficiency displayed by the
Special Branch of the police in ancient times. But then, what do I
know, they may be doing excellent work but the intelligence they
gather may be set aside somewhere along the chain of command. As a
citizen, I would really like to know what the problem is.

Maybe the question to pose is that after two decades of terrorism, why
has Nigeria not publicly posed the question of what the problems of
combating terrorism are so that we can collectively search for an
alternative route to peace and security. My wish remains, obliterate
the terrorists so that we can move on.





Professor Jibrin Ibrahim
Senior Fellow
Centre for Democracy and Development, Abuja
Follow me on twitter @jibrinibrahim17