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The Sahel region, an area covering 3 million km², has been a hotbed of Islamic jihadist groups in recent years.
Today, the region has no less than seven insurgent groups scattered across six countries. The area stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean and encompasses a dozen countries. These include Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Gambia, Guinea, Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal.
Jihadist groups have taken advantage of a number of underlying conditions, which fuel local grievances across the Sahel. These include endemic poverty, inequality, high unemployment rates, illiteracy, ethnic divisions and poor governance.
Groups have made inroads by roaming the vast ungoverned spaces where governments have been largely absent. Here, they helped solve land ownership issues, protected livestock from theft, and prosecuted thieves. They also provided social assistance, distributed food and medicine, offered cash incentives, and provided some forms of government services.
But they are also responsible for atrocities in which thousands of people have died. Such as mass kidnappings, attacks on civilians in villages, schools, as well as attacks on military bases.
Since 2015, the entry into the Sahel of the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq, also known as Daesh, has claimed thousands of lives. This follows the creation of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara by al-Sahrawi who pledged allegiance to ISIS. In the same year, Boko Haram pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. This led to the creation of his dissident faction, the Province of the Islamic State of West Africa.
ISIS in the West African Province and ISIS in the Greater Sahara are known to have attacked military bases in Nigeria, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. Both groups are also known to have kidnapped civilians for ransom. This despite the murder of some key commanders within the groups. Many of these deaths have been attributed to France following the military intervention in Mali in 2013.
Recent reports point to the fate of two key leaders. Reports that the head of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi, was killed have been confirmed. However, reports of the death of Islamic State West Africa province chief Abu Musab Al-Barnawi have not been reported.
Jihadist groups have persevered despite repeated losses previously. In light of recent developments, it is appropriate to assess the extent of the presence of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq in the Sahel region.
Origins of entry into the Sahel region
Before creating the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, al-Sahrawi had been a member of the Polisario Front in Western Sahara, which fought for the independence of Morocco. In 2012, he joined al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and later co-led a Malian Islamist group, the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa.
He then became Commander-in-Chief of al-Mourabitoun, another group affiliated with al-Qaeda, which is currently part of the Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (Support Group for Islam and Muslims) .
Its commitment to the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq was rejected by al-Mourabitoun leader Mokthar Belmokthar as a way to maintain the group’s allegiance to al-Qaeda. This led to the defection of al-Sahrawi and the official establishment of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara in October 2016.
ISIS leaders in Syria and Iraq formally accepted ISIS in the Greater Sahara in April 2019.
In 2018, the Islamic State’s West Africa province led by al-Barnawi was estimated to have 3,500 fighters. It operates primarily in parts of northeastern Nigeria, such as Borno State, which is the epicenter of the Boko Haram insurgency, and the Lake Chad Basin region, which includes Cameroon, Chad. and Niger.
In the same year, the Islamic State of the Greater Sahara was estimated to have 300 fighters. It operates mainly along the Liptako-Gourma region and in other parts of Mali and Niger. The group’s relations with Ansaroul Islam, a jihadist group based in Burkina Faso, have increased the number of its fighters, as have the defections of ex-combatants from Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin.
More recently, the Islamic State of the Greater Sahara has extended its operations to areas of Mali such as the regions of Mopti, Gao and Ménaka, the regions of eastern Burkina Faso and the regions of Tillabery and Tahoua in Niger. The objective of the two groups remains the establishment of a Salafist-jihadist caliphate in the Sahel, under Sharia law.
Despite the death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the head of ISIS Core, the Islamic State of the Greater Sahara and the province of the Islamic State of West Africa continued to perpetuate the attacks. The death of al-Shawari and the unconfirmed death of al-Barnawi are unlikely to make much of a difference in the operations of these groups across the Sahel.
Defeating Daesh in the Sahel
Jihadist groups have demonstrated over the years their ability to put in place internal governance structures allowing for continuity in the event of unforeseen events such as the death of a leader or a commander. The recent Taliban takeover of Afghanistan serves to further embolden these groups.
As national and international security forces continually attempt to degrade, dismantle and defeat these groups by capturing or killing high-value targets, a more results-oriented approach would be to tackle political and socio-political factors. underlying economic factors that fuel their activities in the region. In addition, more efforts to discredit the influence of these groups must be a priority.
Folahanmi Aina does not work, consult, own stock, or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has not disclosed any relevant affiliation beyond his academic appointment.
By Folahanmi Aina, PhD candidate in Leadership Studies, King’s College London
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