For decades, Lake Chad Basin (LCB) countries have grappled with various forms of insecurity including banditry, abduction, highway robbery and cattle rustling among other challenges. In addition, the most significant security challenges confronting the LCB remain the Boko Haram crisis. The death of long-time Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau in May 2021, greatly altered the landscape of violent extremism in the LCB in 2021. While trying to take over territories previously occupied by Shekau’s faction, the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) also attempted to co-opt the late leader’s fighters, with little success. This triggered fierce inter-group clashes and a massive wave of disengagement from Boko Haram that has continued into 2022.

The antecedents of the Boko Haram crisis can largely be traced to the failures of the State and the last decade underscores a context where Boko Haram factions have thrived and evolved through the exploitation of socioeconomic and political gaps.

The Lake Chad Basin Commission sought to coordinate efforts to address cross-border criminality. In the 1990s the same countries created the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF). The decision to create this force to combat organised crime and banditry in the region was first taken in 1994 and by 1998 it was effectively established. By 2015, the deployment of the MNJTF was authorised by the African Union’s (AU) Peace and Security Council in response to the regional character of Boko Haram crisis.

The conflict context is characterised by social (dis)ordering and violence on the margins of states’ responses that are generally targeted at resolving the conflict. OCHA estimates that there are 11.5 million people in need of humanitarian assistance and 3.3 million people affected by food insecurity in the Lake Chad Basin, while the gap in funding has reached US$ 2.5 billion. 

Typology of Conflicts in the Lake Chad Basin 

There is a well-known distinction between the approaches taken by Jama’atu AhlisSunnah Lidda’awati Wal Jihad (JAS) and ISWAP in the LCB, which is mainly in how they perceive and treat civilians, especially Muslim civilians. While JAS does not spare civilians during attacks, ISWAP adopts a more humane approach towards them, seeing them as useful in achieving its objectives of an Islamic state. However, both groups are aligned in their targeting of security forces, government officials, humanitarian and development workers and non-Muslims. 

In Chad, the frequency of major attacks remained largely unchanged between 2021 and the previous year. This may be partly due to the increase of military operations in the region, following the major attack in Boma in 2019 that led to the deaths of 100 soldiers. Attacks have been sporadic, with one notable incident occurring in the Lac region in April, after the death of President Idriss Déby. It is thought that the preoccupation of the security forces with pushing back rebels in the north created a gap that Boko Haram exploited to carry out the attack, which resulted in 40 casualties, mostly military. Although the attack was not claimed by either of the VEGs, it is suspected to have been carried out by JAS

• State versus organised criminality 

The activities of organised crime actors in the LCB even before the advent of the Boko Haram crisis meant that the region presented a fertile ground for violent extremism. Acts of banditry, abduction, highway robbery and cattle rustling have historically been recorded in these spaces. Given that violent extremists are known to take advantage of unresolved local conflicts and criminal activities, it was not surprising that Boko Haram grafted itself onto these existing threats. 

The risks that accompany increased and opportunistic alliances between organised crime actors and violent extremist groups is one that should not be overlooked. Such alliances can create more complexity for the State as it struggles to muster financial and human resources. Overstretched security forces will be a consequence as the diversion of personnel across an increasing space of insecurity becomes necessary. 

An additional dimension of the impact of organised crime relates to the burden on affected communities that already suffer from weak local economies. Regional trade and commercial networks have already been disrupted by the Boko Haram crisis. 6 Such a trend can take a turn for the worse if communities are made to bear the brunt of attacks from bandits and those who abduct for ransom. So far, the State’s ability to contain these actors remains limited.  

• Community violence : inter-community and intra-community trends 

Various intra- and inter-community conflicts were observed in the regions bordering Lake Chad in 2021. These conflicts varied in degree, ranging from the exacerbation of latent tensions to bloody confrontations resulting in several fatalities. The types of activities carried out by these communities lead them to share the same territories, to covet the same arable lands, the same fishing areas and the same pastures. More often than not, claims over these resources are the starting points of conflicts. In Chad, clashes are growing within the Buduma group, with sub-groups opposing each other over the ownership of certain islands or developed polders. Inter-community and resource-based conflicts are often old conflicts transformed by contemporaneous dynamics. These conflicts have either been exacerbated or mitigated by changing power configurations, climate change and resource scarcity in the LCB region.

With the intensity of population movements due to insecurity, conflicts are worsening in all four countries between host populations on the one hand and IDPs and refugees on the other in areas already under climatic stress. Small and light weapons21 have been circulating around Lake Chad over the course of different periods of instability in countries such as Chad. Despites States’ effort to collect them, they seem to resurface during inter-community conflicts that occurred in 2021. In an area already weakened by the presence of Boko Haram, it is important to carefully consider these different sources of tension and inter-community conflicts.

 

The Shifting Position of Actors in the Conflict 

• JAS : Deadly, divided and indiscriminate 

The particular targeting of Muslim civilians became a source of intragroup rift, with Shekau insisting that irrespective of religious affiliation, anyone living under the State was an unbeliever that should be attacked. Some members of Boko Haram, led by Mamman Nur, a cleric, argued against the targeting of Muslim civilians, including using them as suicide bombers.

JAS’ violence against women gained it global notoriety. For the year 2019, the Global Terrorism Index identified the group as responsible for around 80 percent of global fatalities linked to female suicide attacks between 2013 and 2018.

• ISWAP : The international scope and increased presence 

2021 witnessed perhaps the biggest change in the dynamics of the Boko Haram conflict in the LCB and saw ISWAP record major successes. As part of the Islamic State’s expansionist agenda, notably in SubSaharan Africa, ISWAP was instructed to take Shekau out of the equation to pave the way for territorial expansion. Within a month of being reinstalled to ISWAP’s leadership, Abu Musab al-Barnawi led the attack on JAS that conquered Sambisa to establish ISWAP as the dominant group in that area. ISWAP leveraged its affiliation to the Islamic State (ISIS) to gain support from the global terror group for this move, with former fighters returning mostly from Libya to rejoin ISWAP and be part of the attack against JAS.

ISWAP became the dominant VEG in the region. Significantly, while attacks against security forces intensified, attacks against civilians reduced. Its successes notwithstanding, ISWAP faced major challenges. The group has always been known to experience frequent internal power struggles and leadership changes.

• The Communities 

Communities are at the centre of the ongoing crisis and violence in the LCB region, notably between VEGs and security forces. As a result, they are sometimes caught in the middle of hostilities with accusations from each party of supporting the other. This has led to communities occasionally being victimised by both sides of the conflict. This is in spite of the enormous losses they have suffered in lives, livelihoods, displacement and the associated ills of hunger and disease which accompany such dislocations. Boko Haram targets communities as well, looting them to restock their supplies abduction for ransom, unpaid labour, as sex slaves and forced marriages.

The presence or absence of the State in the peripheral areas of Lake Chad has a strong link with the narrative, ideology and actions of Boko Haram. From the outset, the group built its messaging on the perceived corruption of the State and its political elite. Boko Haram built its recruitment discourse on the failures of the State, its inability to provide basic services, including security, especially in remote communities. On the ground, Boko Haram’s main objective has been to neutralise and eradicate the four riparian states’ presence in the targeted communities, presenting itself as the sole provider of these services.

 

Socio-economic and humanitarian consequences 

The socio-economic impact of the conflict reflects a continuation of the trends that were earlier observed. Economic actors that lost their livelihoods due to Boko Haram activities or due to the government’s response have struggled to recover their incomes. Communities are also facing challenges with the appropriation of livelihood activities by state and non-state actors. 

Although Boko Haram sometimes offers safe passage to farms, this often comes at the cost of taxes levied on farmers. These farmers are also at risk of retaliatory attacks if Boko Haram suspects their collaboration with security forces. 

The humanitarian situation in the region continued to be challenging, with millions of people still displaced amid ongoing conflict. Humanitarian actors have long been targeted by both ISWAP and JAS. Over the years, humanitarian workers lost their lives both during attacks and while in captivity. The enormous risks faced by NGOs and their staff complicate their ability to deliver critical services, especially in hard-to-reach communities. In 2021, ISWAP particularly posed a serious security challenge to humanitarian actors, further limiting their ability to provide much needed humanitarian assistance to populations.  There were at least six Boko Haram incidents that involved humanitarian actors, all perpetrated by ISWAP between January and April.

Policy Recommendations 

For the LCB countries : 

• There is a need to better align political will with the mobilisation of public resources towards security and development in the LCB. Platforms such as the LCB Governors’ Forum already contribute to this objective, but it is vital that commitments made translate into real and measurable results in the coming months.
• It is essential that LCB governments demonstrate political will towards higher accountability and reforms in the justice system. 
• There should be a constant monitoring of changing community needs in order to ensure the responsiveness of government measures. Heads of regions, departments and communes in the contexts of Cameroon, Chad and Niger, and heads of local government areas in the context of Nigeria, should work more closely with the various societal groups embedded in communities.

For Regional Actors : 

• The African Union should continue to provide guidance that can shape approaches to key issues such as deradicalisation and reintegration based on their experience in other countries. 
• The transnational nature of the crisis in the LCB calls for regional and continentwide cooperation between the LCB and other (sub)regional blocs in North Africa, the Sahel, Central Africa, and East and the Horn of Africa.

For International Actors : 

• The World Bank is another key player in the stabilisation agenda. There is a need to ensure the complementarity of interventions by different actors in order to build on and not replicate activities.
• The support of key implementing partners such as the UNDP remains vital particularly through the Regional Stabilisation Facility. The coordinating role the UNDP – through its support to the RSS Secretariat – plays remains critical.