Features
By
Philip Obaji
When Boko Haram stormed
the Cameroonian border town of Fotokol in January 2016, it looked like it was
yet another episode of killings, petrol bombing, and abductions, but the
jihadists had a different strategy in mind.
Armed with machetes and
machine guns, the militants shot at every man they saw, and instead of setting
fire around compounds like they’ve often done in previous assaults, they
gathered cows and goats and fled.
“Nowadays they attack like
armed robbers,” said Mbia, who fled Fotokol to Mamfe in southwestern Cameroon.
“All they want is your goat, cow, and sheep.”
Reports of stealing of
livestock by Boko Haram fighters in Cameroon have been on the increase since
the start of last year. In one attack early January 2016, the militants
reportedly invaded a town in far north Cameroon and took wheelbarrows,
bicycles, and 150 small animals such as sheep and goats, and in the process,
kidnapped six people to help lead the animals back into Nigeria.
“They (Boko Haram
militants) have just one destination which is the cattle market in Maiduguri
(the biggest city in northeastern Nigeria),” a security official said. “They
have their own traders and butchers who sell and make returns.”
The massively depleted
Boko Haram sect needs money to stay afloat. As the jihadists keep losing
territories to government forces, so also do their valuables go with it. Guns,
cars, factories, and even cash have been surrendered to a very determined
coalition military. Now, for them to survive, they have to sell what they have,
or put it – what they think they have.
Boko Haram was once a
buoyant group – controlling trade and fuel supply in an area in northeastern
Nigeria as large as the size of Belgium. But a severe military campaign by
Nigerian forces and its neighbours chased them away from virtually all the
territories they once controlled and dealt a severe blow on their finances.
Now, the militants see an easy way of recouping lost funds in raiding helpless
villages for whatever livestock they can find and then sell them in the open
market.
“They (Boko Haram) are not
just attacking communities and taking away their livestock, but are also
killing cattle ranchers and taking away their herds,” said Mbia, whose 30 cows
were stolen by the militants in Fotokol. “Once they take your cattle, they ask
you to escort the cattle into Nigeria. If you refuse, they kill you.”
It’s a long walk from
Fotokol to Maiduguri, the capital of Nigeria’s northeastern Borno state, where
most of the cattle are sold. Many of the ranchers who were forced by Boko Haram
militants to travel hundreds of kilometers with their cattle to Nigeria never
returned.
“Some left early last year
(referring to 2015), and up till this moment they’ve not returned,” Mbia told
me in the southern Nigeria town of Ikom, at the border with Cameroon. “We don’t
know if they’re still alive or if they’ve been killed by the militants.”
Boko Haram has reportedly
killed many ranchers in far north Cameroon. In early 2016, about 15 ranchers
were reportedly killed along the border with Nigeria and their cattle escaped
to nearby hills, but no one had the courage to go to the border to retrieve the
cows.
“Even if you succeed [in
retrieving the cows] they’ll still come back at you,” Mbia, who travels often
to Nigeria to sell fabric, said. “They act as if their lives depend on the
cattle.”
The jihadists have an indirect
presence in the cattle market in parts of Nigeria’s northeastern Borno State,
where it has carried out most of its operation since 2009. Whenever livestock
is stolen in Cameroon, the militants move them across the Nigerian border into
main markets in Maiduguri, also the capital of Borno. The movement is usually
aided by ranchers, who are forced by the jihadists to first raid cattle from
other villages, and then move them under close supervision to Nigeria.
Once in Borno, the
militants move their livestock to communities close to Maiduguri, before
handing them over to middlemen (most of whom are trained ranchers) who move the
cattle to the open market and then sell to customers at prices far cheaper than
the regular market price.
“They take out more than
50 percent of the main market price and sell at a cheap price,” Mohammed Usman,
who trades in the city’s cattle market, told me in Maiduguri. “Because their
cattle are far less expensive, people buy a lot from them.”
But the proceeds don’t
usually return to the militants in cash. Most part of the monies made by the
agents is used to buy essential things such as food and fuel for the jihadists
who’ve been suffering from a shortage of these commodities after supply routes
were blocked by the Nigerian military.
The middlemen also get
their percentage based on their agreement with the jihadists. But those with
knowledge of the trade say the militants are usually short-changed in the
business.
“The middlemen sell so
cheap and declare even less to Boko Haram who can’t say anything because they
have no direct access to the market,” Usman, who has kept a close eye on these
middlemen, said. “They could sell a cow usually worth 200,000 naira (about $650)
for as little as 40,000 naira (about $65), and declare just 20,000 naira (about
$33) to the militants.”
Boko Haram militants can’t
access the market themselves as chances are high that they’ll be caught by
security forces once they enter Maiduguri. This situation has forced the
militants to direct their cattle to the market through unscrupulous agents.
In September, the Nigerian
army announced that it had arrested three men working as ranchers for the group
in Azare community in the northeastern state of Yobe, as they tried to sell
some stolen livestock to raise money for the jihadists.
Muhammed Bulama, his elder
brother Ardo Abba Muhammed and Muhammadu Kaigama all confessed to army
officials that they were responsible for keeping and taking care of all cows,
sheep, and horses stolen or seized by Boko Haram.
The army said the
apprehended men came to the community to sell the livestock “as they had run
out of cash in their hideout” and would have used some of the proceeds from the
sale to “get some food items back (to Boko Haram militants) for the upcoming
Sallah festivity.”
“They were arrested riding
on horseback and bicycle shepherding some sheep towards the market,” said army
spokesman, Colonel Sani Usman, who also mentioned that the operation was possible
“with the help of the local vigilantes in the town.”
The men had been on the
radar of security agencies for a long time. Bulama, for instance, was number
105 on the photo album of most wanted terror kingpins published by the army.
But even those with the
duty to fight Boko Haram, have also aided the jihadists in carrying out the
cattle business.
In October 2016, 30 people
were arrested by the Nigerian military for allegedly helping the militants to
sell rustled cows. Among them were at least four serving soldiers, two police
officers, and some members of the vigilante group, the Civilian Joint Task
Force (CJTF).
A security official who
did not want his name mentioned, explained that for each cow that passes into
Maiduguri, unscrupulous members of the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF)
operating in sector II (one of the group’s 10 command units in the Borno state
capital) get paid 5,000 naira (about $16.5) by agents working for Boko Haram.
“The cattle have to pass
through the area they operate to get to market,” the official said. “The boys
made lots of money in the process.”
The amount of money made
from the business was indeed huge. One of the arrested leaders of CJTF had more
than 60 million naira in his bank account at the time he was arrested, the
official said.
“He started to live big,”
a close associate of the arrested CJTF leader said of him. “He even bought
himself a Mercedes-Benz C-class.”
No doubt the cattle trade
richly benefited the dubious officials and the very desperate militants.
Boko Haram is a group
currently surviving on livestock sale. The jihadists are believed to have
stolen thousands of livestock–by some estimate over 50,000–in northeast Nigeria
and Far North Cameroon.
The influential Cattle
Breeders Association in northeastern Nigeria said about 1,900 herdsmen were
killed by Boko Haram terrorists in separate attacks in four years in Borno.
Chairman of the
Association, Ibrahim Mafa, said that members of the association also lost about
169,000 cows; 63,000 rams; goats and sheep to the insurgency.
“We also lost about
400,000 sacks of grains and a number of our members were displaced,” Mafa told
the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in August. “Our herdsmen have lost cows, property,
and houses worth about N26 billion in 10 local government areas in Northern
Borno.
In Cameroon, Boko Haram
was estimated to have stolen at least 5,000 herds of cattle by early February,
most of which were sold in the open market in Nigeria.
“In 2014, 1,160 cattle
were stolen from our people by the Boko Haram criminal and barbaric group,”
Cameroon government spokesman Issa Tchiroma Bakary said, “In 2015, the number
of cattle stolen on the Cameroonian territory was about 4,200 excluding small
ruminants.”
The influence of Boko
Haram in the Borno state cattle market earlier on forced the government to act
after security officials discovered that “most of the cattle being traded at
the markets were the direct proceeds of cattle rustling perpetrated by Boko
Haram insurgents.”
A statement from the Borno
state governor’s office in March 2016 announced the temporary ban of “all
trading activities at the Gamboru cattle markets, Dusuman, Shuwari and Ngom,”
in what the government later explained was in line with its “commitment to
ensure that no public place is turned to avenue for funding activities of the
terrorists.”
The government also
suspended importation of cattle to the state capital for at least two weeks and
gave permission for the slaughter and sale of cattle to only the Butchers
Association and Cattle Traders Association.
Dried meat was also banned
and a civil-military management team set up to enforce stringent conditions in
slaughterhouses including a close monitoring of activities of cattle traders
and butchers to stop all illegal businesses.
But all that did not
completely stop Boko Haram from finding buyers for its cattle. In a country
were herdsmen have the freedom to travel hundreds of kilometers to sell their
cattle, the suspension only became a case of the jihadists finding an
alternative place to trade.
The decision of the
government then to shut down the markets expectedly affected businesses far
beyond Borno. Much of Nigeria’s cattle trade passes through the northeast state
and the closures reportedly caused cattle prices to rise in the south, creating
lots of panic.
“It doesn’t stop them (the
militants) from doing business,” one Maiduguri market trader said. “Boko Haram
can take their cattle to the neighboring states and sell them while the common
man suffers to find meat.”
The market was reopened in
May, but the recent arrest of military officers and members of the CJTF
suggests that the jihadists have not given up doing business in Maiduguri.
This article written by
Philip Obaji Jr. appeared originally on Ventures Africa.
Photo Credit:Ventures
Africa
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