海角大神

A version of this post originally appeared on blog. The views expressed are the author's own.聽

The jihadi insurgency called Boko Haram appears to have reduced its operations in urban areas. This follows the massive deployment of security forces in northeastern Nigeria in line with the Abuja government鈥檚 June proclamation of a state of emergency in Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa.

According to the media,聽聽in some parts of Maiduguri. However, the Nigerian security services claimed in October that they thwarted a possible terrorist attack in Kano, Nigeria鈥檚 second largest city.聽

Despite this relative calm in urban areas, Boko Haram killings and kidnappings have not diminished. Recent analysis of the Council on Foreign Relations鈥櫬犅爄ndicates that they have in fact increased.

Fighting has instead shifted to rural areas. The media reports Boko Haram efforts to聽聽on the road between Kano and Maiduguri by targeting truck drivers, whom they behead using chain saws.

There are also media reports of Boko Haram carrying out聽, with the alternative being death.

This pivot to the countryside follows a familiar pattern.聽When the Nigerian army crushed the 鈥淣igerian Taleban鈥� in 1993, operatives melted into the countryside. In 2009, when the security forces murdered Boko Haram leader Mohammed Yusuf and some 800 of his followers in Maiduguri, the movement went underground and regrouped under the current leader, Abubakar Shekau.

While the relationship between the 鈥淣igerian Taleban鈥� and 鈥淏oko Haram鈥� is murky, both are violent jihadi movements that seek to impose a strict sharia regime on northern Nigeria and perhaps the rest of the country, as well.

So long as northern Nigeria remains alienated from the government in Abuja and profoundly impoverished, with the worst social statistics in the country, jihadi insurrections are likely to be reoccurring.