Boko Haram Makes Bloody Mark Again

AFTER hibernating for five years, Boko Haram shattered the relative peace of the North-East again at the weekend, making a bloody mark on Gwoza in southern Borno State. The insurgents let loose young female suicide bombers in the state. The cost is heavy: 18 slaughtered and 42 injured. The death toll hit 20 on Monday. This is a harsh reminder that Islamic terrorism is still deeply rooted in the North-East despite the pretentiousness in government.

The attacks on Gwoza bore all the toxic imprimatur of Boko Haram. They were well coordinated, catching the security teams off-guard. A female suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device at a wedding on Saturday, wreaking mass mayhem. This triggered other calculated convulsions near the General Hospital. As the weary residents began burying the dead, another suicide bomber hit them at the funeral.

This is most callous, but it is the way terrorists operate for maximum impact: when you least expect it. Women and children were the worst hit. In Pulka, a suicide bomber attacked a checkpoint the same day. Two farmers were incinerated on Sunday when an IED exploded on the Kekeno-Cross Kauwa and Monguno Highway.

In the past 10 years, Boko Haram and its splinter force, ISWAP, have rendered the Biu-Maiduguri Highway unsafe. On June 24, terrorists kidnapped a Borno State High Court judge, Haruna Mshelia, his wife, driver, and a police detail there.

Like other terror-afflicted countries, Nigeria is paying a huge price.

Apart from instigating a staggering number of internally displaced persons, Borno Governor, Babagana Zulum remarked in an August 2023 note to UNICEF that Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe – the epicentre of the insurgency – have lost 100,000 citizens to attacks in the 13 years to 2023. The North-East states lost $100 billion to terrorism in the same period.

Boko Haram gained notoriety for the UN Headquarters bombing in Abuja in 2010, the Madalla bus park bombing in 2014, the April 2014 mass abduction of 276 Chibok schoolgirls in Borno, the simulated bombings in Kano in January 2012 that caused 178 deaths, and the mass abduction of Dapchi schoolgirls in Yobe under Buhari.

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