Africa in Transition

Below is a visualization and description of some of the most significant incidents of political violence in Nigeria from May 5 to May 11, 2018. This update also represents violence related to Boko Haram in Cameroon, Chad, and Niger. These incidents will be included in the Nigeria Security Tracker.     var divElement = document.getElementById('viz1526303803647'); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName('object')[0]; vizElement.style.width='100%';vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+'px'; var scriptElement = document.createElement('script'); scriptElement.src = 'https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js'; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement);   May 5: Boko Haram killed two customs officials, two forestry agents, one soldier, and one civilian in Gabalami, Chad. May 5: Bandits killed seventy-one in Birnin Gwari, Kaduna. May 4 and May 6: A cult clash resulted in thirteen deaths in Jos North, Plateau. May 7: A communal clash led to eleven deaths in Odukpani, Cross River. May 9: Two suicide bombers tried to attack a mosque in Maiduguri, Borno but ran away and ended up killing themselves but no others. Boko Haram was suspected. May 9: Herdsmen killed nine in Ussa, Taraba.  May 9: The JTF killed ten bandits in Lau, Taraba.  May 9: Herdsmen killed eight in Numan, Adamawa.  May 10: Police and 'Land Grabbers' killed five in Lagos State, Lagos.  May 11: Nigerian troops killed eight bandits in Maru, Zamfara. May 11: Nigerian troops killed ten bandits in Numan, Adamawa. 

This is a guest blog post by Sherrie Russell-Brown. Sherrie is a researcher, consultant, and international lawyer focusing on armed conflict, gender, security, international justice, and humanitarian law in sub-Saharan Africa. She coordinates a collaborative group of experts dedicated to promoting research and analysis of the Sahel, and, in particular, the Boko Haram insurgency. Sherrie holds a Juris Doctor and Master of Laws in human rights law from Columbia University School of Law. Following Boko Haram’s abduction of girls from a school in Dapchi, International Crisis Group released a report in April on how to prevent future kidnappings in Nigeria. It lays out in detail what steps the Nigerian government, foreign governments, and local actors should take to defeat Boko Haram and overcome the destruction that they have wrought. Moreover, Crisis Group also examined Boko Haram’s gender-based violence and has proposed ways to address it. To date, not one member of Boko Haram has been prosecuted for sexual violence. Yet, as President Buhari mulls granting amnesty to repentant members of Boko Haram, justice requires accountability for their crimes, including those that are gender-based.  It is worth noting that the protocols and laws needed to do this are already in place. A core strategic objective under Pillar 3 of Nigeria's second National Action Plan (2017-2020) for the Implementation of UNSCR 1325 and related resolutions is the protection of women’s and girls' rights and security and prosecution of violators of such rights. Nigeria has also ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (Maputo Protocol), enacted the Child Rights Act (CRA) and the Violence Against Persons Prohibition (VAPP) Act. However, as is often the case, the implementation of these laws, policies, agreements, and protocols is the challenge. To be clear, both genders have been targeted by Boko Haram. In February 2014, less than two months before the Chibok girls were kidnapped, Boko Haram killed at least twenty-nine male students at the Federal Government College, Buni Yadi, in Yobe state. Men and boys have been abducted, killed, or forcibly conscripted by Boko Haram.  However, Crisis Group brings much-needed attention to the prominent role that violence against women and girls plays in Boko Haram’s ideology and actions. Girls' education, and with it girls' empowerment, are under direct attack by the group. The insurgents who returned the Dapchi girls warned residents against sending their daughters back to school, or else they would be kidnapped again. (Fifteen-year old Leah Sharibu, the lone Christian among the Dapchi girls, refused to convert to Islam and remains in captivity.) In addition, Boko Haram has used women and girls as person-borne improvised explosive devices (PBIEDs), so-called “suicide bombers,” more than any other terrorist group in history. By the end of 2017, 454 women and girls had been deployed or arrested in 232 incidents, which killed 1,225 people. Reported incidents of Boko Haram rape, sexual slavery, forced marriages, and other incidents of sexual violence in northeast Nigeria increased from 644 in 2016 to 997 in 2017. But women are more than just victims. While some are, of course, supporters of Boko Haram and perpetrators of violence themselves, they have also played a vital role in the fight against the group. In the opening scene of Black Panther, Okoye, the head of King T’Challa's all-female personal security, the Dora Milaje and Nakia, a female Wakandan intelligence officer, help rescue a group of women (and a male child soldier) who had been abducted by an extremist terror network reminiscent of Boko Haram. In that spirit, Aisha Bakari Gombi, also known as the “Queen Hunter,” commands a band of male hunters and has helped the Nigerian military fight Boko Haram and rescue hundreds of men, women, and children in northeast Nigeria. Off the battlefield, Oby Ezekwesili, Saudatu Mahdi and Hadiza Bala Usman, cofounders of #BringBackOurGirls, have been campaigning for the return, reintegration, and rehabilitation of abductees of Boko Haram of both genders. Hamsatu Allamin has been working to change the narrative of "Boko Haram" (roughly translated as "education is a sin") to "Boko Halal" ("education is good"). One education initiative underway is an Africa-America Institute plan to introduce a new digital learning tool in Nigeria and Ghana. She has also highlighted the need for a communication strategy to counter the influence of Boko Haram. Eleanor Nwadinobi has worked to increase the participation of women and girls in peacebuilding institutions by supporting safe spaces called "peace clubs." As Justice Louis Brandeis once remarked, "[s]unlight is said to be the best of disinfectants." Once we have acknowledged Boko Haram’s sexual and gender-based crimes, however, providing justice to survivors and victims is an essential next step.   

Much of the current conversation in South Africa around black poverty links it to the disproportionate white ownership of the commercial agricultural sector. Simply put, the narrative within the governing African National Congress (ANC), the radical Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), and many others, is that enduring black poverty is a result of the white domination of land ownership, itself the result of colonialism and apartheid. The EFF’s Julius Malema and the ANC’s Jacob Zuma highlighted that the disproportionate ownership of the land by white South Africans was an historic injustice and its perpetuation a moral outrage. Indeed, much of the public conversation about land ownership is conducted in moral, rather than economic terms. However, if the goal is the reduction of poverty, there should be more focus on education and labor policy and less on land reform, which is increasingly irrelevant to most South Africans. About half of South Africa’s population is poor by most standard measurements, and the poverty rate is not decreasing. Most, but not all, of the poor are part of the 90 percent of the population that is black or "coloured," while the white minority of 9 percent by and large enjoys a standard of living comparable to that of the developed economies of eastern Europe. South Africa’s Gini coefficient, a standard measure of inequality, is among the highest in the world.  Certainly white ownership of most of the productive land shaped the modern history of South Africa, just as the potato famine shaped modern Ireland, the highland clearances modern Scotland, and the forced expulsion of Native Americans the westward expansion of the United States. In the twenty-first century, however, white land ownership would seem to be increasingly marginal as a cause of black poverty. South Africa is predominately an industrial, information, and market-driven economy. The country is already about 60 percent urban and urbanizing rapidly. Few who migrate from rural to urban areas appear to wish to return to the land. In fact, most of those indemnified by the post-apartheid state for the seizure of their land under apartheid opted for a cash payment rather than the land itself. Experiences elsewhere show that the establishment of small holders through land reform requires the state to provide significant technical and financial support if they are to succeed, which successive post-apartheid South African governments have been unable or unwilling to do. Furthermore, while both Zuma, Malema (ironically fierce personal enemies), and like-minded politicians have sought to build political support by advocating “expropriation of land without compensation,” it is not clear that there is still substantial demand for such a change in the rural areas. There is, however, demand for security of tenure from black farmers, especially those working in tribal trust areas where fee-simple ownership of land is absent. Moreover, there is real land hunger in urban and suburban areas, where new arrivals from rural areas too often find land unavailable, resulting in squatter settlements in which residents have little security of tenure. Much of the political discourse surrounding the subject is largely irrelevant to  the kind of land reform demanded by much of the public. There appears to be a correlation between poverty and unemployment. The country’s unemployment rate is usually estimated to be around 25 percent, rising to 50 percent among males in the townships. Female unemployment in rural areas is similarly very high. Meanwhile, potential employers complain about a shortage of workers. Unemployment is exacerbated by the failure of the educational system to prepare students to participate in the modern economy. The issue is not government funding—in some years, South Africa spends up to 25 percent of the government’s budget on education. Rather, education innovation and reform is held hostage by the political power within the ANC of the teachers unions, poor teacher training and discipline, and the multiplicity (eleven) of legal languages, among others. English—the international language of business—is the first language of only 9 percent of the population, and they are mostly white. Elementary education of black children is too often is in African languages or Afrikaans rather than in English. South African labor policy has long favored a high-skilled, high-wage work force. That approach is strongly supported by organized labor, an important part of the ANC’s electoral base. Unsurprisingly, a large percentage of the unemployed and the poor are unskilled because the economy has too few low-skilled and low-wage opportunities, and there is little space for organized labor in that respect. The bottom line is that, in order to address the drivers of poverty in a meaningful way, there should be more focus on education and labor policy and less on the distraction of land reform.