Boko Haram

For John, BLUF:  Nigeria is the 8th largest petroleum exporting nation and a collapse would impact world oil prices negatively.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Here is a good question from The New Yorker, As the Year Ends, Where Are Nigeria’s Kidnapped Girls?.  The author is Ms Alexis Okeowo, who is a contributing writer for The New Yorker.  She is based in Lagos, Nigeria.

Most of them are still being held by the group Boko Haram,♠ which is conducting a Stage I (Terrorism) Insurgency against the Government of Nigeria.

Every now and then, a girl might find an opportunity to run away, but Boko Haram has been kidnapping girls and young women for a long time; we know from those who have escaped (sometimes pregnant or with a small child) that they are often handed off to militants as sex slaves or forced to perform tasks for the terrorist group.

With an election for President of Nigeria in the offing, here is a summary of the situation:

The country’s northeast is a humanitarian disaster.  A million six hundred thousand people are homeless, waiting on handouts and unable to farm their land.  A famine is possible.  Refugee camps are overcrowded and woefully bare of services. The region has collapsed in on itself.  President Jonathan, who has presided over the conflict with a mixture of indifference and annoyance, is trying to convince Nigerians that he deserves another chance to bring prosperity to Nigeria, which will have to mean ending Boko Haram’s reign.  But his administration’s incompetency in the war may be the biggest selling point for his opponent, Muhammadu Buhari, who, despite having already ruled Nigeria as a military dictator in the nineteen-eighties, has somehow ended up as the man some Nigerians see as one of their country’s last hopes.

I would say this is a good point at which the magazine Rolling Stone can redeem itself after that atrocious effort regarding alleged gang rape at UVA.  With Boko Haram we have not only gang rape, but also mass kidnappings and the selling of women into slavery, including sexual slavery.  An ugly mix that will not be solved by suggesting to the overseers that "Yes means Yes".  And Hash Tags are not going to do it.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Translated into English, Boko Haram means "Western education is forbidden", although the official name of the Insurgent Group is Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'Awati Wal-Jihad (People Committed to the Prophet's Teachings for Propagation and Jihad).  They, too, wish to set up a new Caliphate.