LITTLE CHAD HELPING BIG BROTHER NIGERIA BY LEADING WAR ON BOKO HARAM

Chadian soldiers patrol in the Nigerian border town of Gamboru after taking control of the city. Chadian forces began an offensive last month against Boko Haram, intervening in neighboring Cameroon and clearing rebels from the northeastern Nigerian town Gamboru. 

-- Nigeria, with Africa’s biggest economy, is relying on poorer neighbor Chad to spearhead the battle against the Islamist militant group Boko Haram so it can put in place the security it needs to hold delayed presidential elections next month.
Chadian forces began an offensive last month against Boko Haram, intervening in neighboring Cameroon and clearing rebels from the northeastern Nigerian town Gamboru. They’ve arrived with a reputation for desert-combat prowess after fighting Islamist insurgents alongside French troops in Mali in 2013.
“The Chadian army is now coming in with momentum, coming in on the back of their experience in Mali, and having dealt with the rebels in the east of Chad,” Murtala Touray, senior Africa analyst at IHS Country Risk in London, said by phone.
The army in Nigeria, which spends almost $6 billion a year on its security forces, or about half the value of Chad’s economy, has fared less well. The electoral commission delayed presidential and legislative elections from Feb. 14 to March 28 after President Goodluck Jonathan’s national security adviser said the military couldn’t ensure a peaceful vote.
Nigeria’s population of 170 million is 14 times bigger than that of Chad, which is home to about half the number of people who live in Lagos, the commercial capital of Africa’s biggest oil producer. The gross domestic product of Nigeria is about $522 billion and its people, measured on a purchasing power parity basis, are almost three times richer than those of Chad, according to International Monetary Fund data.
Escalating Conflict
“It’s a sad fact that this is bound to emphasize some of the limitations of the Nigerian military, and there are now plenty of people inside the army who can see how bad all this looks,” James Hall, a former U.K. military attache to Nigeria, said by phone on Tuesday.
Boko Haram, which roughly translates as “western education is a sin,” has been fighting for the past six years to set up a self-styled caliphate and is sucking the region into an escalating conflict.
At least 1,600 people died in Boko Haram attacks in January, Bath, U.K.-based risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft, said in a Feb. 11 report. The militants killed more than 4,700 last year, double the number in 2013, according to the consultancy.
A suicide bomber killed at least seven people and wounded 15 after she set off explosives at a busy market in the northeast town of Biu on Thursday, Yau Mohammed, a witness who helped take victims to the hospital after the blast, said by phone.
Nigerian Initiative
Nigerian military spokesman Chris Olukolade denied that Chad was leading the fight against Boko Haram.
“It is the Nigerian forces that planned and are driving the present onslaught against terrorists from all fronts not the Chadian or other forces as propagated by the Western and some local media,” he said Wednesday in a text-message response to questions. “The Chadians are however keying very well into and working in concert within the overall plan for an all-round move against the terrorists.”
President Jonathan said Wednesday in a live interview on NTA, a state-owned television channel, that he expects Nigerian and regional forces to deal Boko Haram significant defeats in the coming weeks.
Intensifying Campaign
“It seems unlikely that they’re going to be able to decisively defeat Boko Haram in six weeks,” Alex Thurston, an assistant professor at Georgetown University who specializes in Islam in Africa, said by phone on Tuesday from Washington.
“Even though the elections have been postponed, I think when the elections take place it will occur in a climate of continued insecurity.”
The growth of Boko Haram and its intensifying campaign of violence is a result of the government’s failure to respond to the insurgency, former President Olusegun Obasanjo said late Wednesday.
“That can only be as a result of inadequate action, both in terms of stick and carrot,” Obasanjo told reporters in London at an event to promote his memoirs.
Many Nigerian soldiers are ill-equipped and demoralized, highlighting what many critics say is endemic corruption sapping the army, according to analysts such as Touray. They try to avoid postings to the northeast, where they come up against highly mobile, heavily armed and motivated Boko Haram militants, he said.
Soldiers Mutiny
A military court in December sentenced 54 soldiers to death by firing squad for “conspiracy to commit mutiny.” It followed a guilty verdict against 12 soldiers in September for staging a mutiny in the northeastern state of Borno, Boko Haram’s stronghold.
“There is a complete disincentive for them to fight,” Touray said.
Nigeria, Chad, Benin, Niger and Cameroon pledged this month to build an 8,700-strong force to fight Boko Haram and base it in the Chadian capital, N’Djamena.
Chad’s involvement carries risks.
While Chad’s army won praise for its role in Mali, it withdrew from the multinational force in Central African Republic after complaints by local residents about its use of violence, Marielle Debos, a professor at the University of Paris, said by phone. Chad denied allegations by the United Nations that its troops fired on civilians in Bangui in March.
‘Desert Warriors’
“The Chadian army has always benefited from a certain image of being hardened desert warriors,” Debos said. “But this shouldn’t hide the violence they have often been accused of, and the impunity that their leaders benefit from.”
Chadian President Idriss Deby may see political benefits in fighting Boko Haram, said Thurston at Georgetown University.
“Idriss Deby has been in power in Chad since 1990 and faced severe rebellions against his rule, particularly in 2006 and 2008, and relied on French assistance to overcome those challenges,” he said. “He’s had an incentive to present himself as someone who is vital to keep peace and stability in the wider region.”