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| Men gather during a mass burial at Zabarmari, in the Jere local government area of Borno State, in northeast Nigeria, on Nov. 29 after a militant attack. (Ahmed Kingimi/Reuters) |
The massacre on 29 November of at least 43 farm labourers outside Nigeria’s northeastern city of Maiduguri has shocked even this war-numbed country. The migrant workers were all decapitated or had their throats slit by Abubakar Shekau’s faction of Boko Haram.
It was punishment, the jihadists said, for the passing of information to
the army by farmers tired of the insurgents’ extortion. In a staggeringly tone-deaf comment, a senior government official
blamed the farmers for not seeking military clearance before heading to the
fields.
In the ensuing uproar, there have been demands
for President Muhammadu Buhari to resign – even from within his northern powerbase. Northern social media has also attacked
his more general failure to #SecureNorth – a reference to the wider banditry
roiling the region.
Nigeria’s powerful governors are
backing calls to hire private military companies, like South Africa’s
STTEP.
“Nigeria has made no visible headway despite
sinking billions of dollars to prosecute the war,” Idayat Hassan of the Centre
for Democracy and Development told The New Humanitarian. “We, the citizens, are
just helpless onlookers.”
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