₦airaland Forum

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Blood of Gawd, no!

The catalog of atrocities committed by Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram is harrowing.

Hundreds, possibly thousands, of women and children have been abducted from their homes. Captives report being gang-raped and forced into sexual slavery. Young girls have been sent to blow themselves up in suicide attacks. The relentless slaughter of men, women and children has made Boko Haram the deadliest terrorist group in the world in recent years.

Why would anyone join such a group?

A new report by aid agency Mercy Corps seeks to answer that question. The U.S.-based group interviewed 47 former members about the reasons they entered Boko Haram and published its findings this week.

The militant group has thousands of members, including fighters and people playing other supportive roles, such as smuggling and logistics, analysts say. Its ranks are made up mostly of young men, but it also has some female recruits.

The Mercy Corps report paints a complex picture of Boko Haram’s recruitment tactics.

First, though Boko Haram has lately become notorious for abducting children and forcing captives to fight or carry out suicide attacks, not all recruits join against their will.

Most ex-members interviewed by Mercy Corps fell in the gray area between coercion and choice. Some said they were threatened; some faced extreme pressure from friends, family or colleagues, while others saw the group as their least bad option in impoverished and marginalized northeast Nigeria.

“I officially joined them when they started killing indiscriminately,” one man told Mercy Corps. “I needed protection and immunity from persecution by them so I could continue with my business.”

Second, the group attracts recruits with a blend of religious ideology, social pressure and economic incentives.

The financial draw is not just about escaping poverty and unemployment, both of which are high in northeast Nigeria. In fact, the study found Boko Haram recruits poor and rich, employed and unemployed alike.

Rather, the group plays on the ambitions of young men who are struggling to get ahead in an area with scant financial services and pernicious inequality and corruption.

Several former recruits depicted Boko Haram as a mafia-style organization, offering young entrepreneurs loans for small businesses like shops, salons and tailors and then forcing them to join the group when they couldn’t repay the loan.

One man told Mercy Corps that his Boko Haram recruiter “started playing me their preaching tapes to convince me, and he equally started [financially] assisting me and my parents.” Soon after, his recruiter made it clear that he was obligated to join Boko Haram because of these financial “gifts,” so he fled for his life.

Third, nearly half of the Boko Haram recruits interviewed for the study were women. Some of them were abducted or coerced by their husbands into joining; others were recruited voluntarily by friends or family.

Some women told Mercy Corps that joining Boko Haram provided opportunities for religious study and status within the militant group.

“I just wanted to learn more of the Quran and my religion,” one woman told Mercy Corps.

The study provides an important insight into the profile and motivations of Boko Haram members and offers strategies to stem the flow of recruits. Mercy Corps urged more access to financial services, reintegration of former fighters and support for counter-narratives that have already proved effective against Boko Haram in northeast Nigeria.

But it should be read with attention to an important piece of context — Boko Haram has changed almost beyond recognition since it first emerged in 2002.

Before the death of its founder, Muhammed Yusuf, in 2009, the group was a radical but predominantly nonviolent sect that espoused strict Islamic governance as the answer to the region’s rampant corruption. After Yusuf was killed, Boko Haram went underground and re-emerged as a brutal insurgency under its hardline and elusive new leader, Abubakar Shekau.

The study found a “marked difference” in Boko Haram’s recruitment techniques after 2009, Mercy Corps’ Rebecca Wolfe, who worked on the report, told The WorldPost.

“As Boko Haram’s tactics became more violent, community acceptance started to go and people weren’t joining as much as being coerced,” she said.

Further, some researchers said that the study’s depiction of Boko Haram attracting wealthier recruits through a coercive micro-lending scheme was more typical of the earlier days of the group under Mohammed Yusuf.

“Yusuf was a wealthy man himself, as well as a charismatic preacher,” Virginia Comolli, the author of Boko Haram: Nigeria’s Islamist Insurgency, told The WorldPost. “He was able to offer people small amounts of money which they used to set up small businesses like motorbike taxis and paid the proceeds back into the group as membership fees.”

“It was both a way of attracting people and attracting revenues.”

Comolli and other researchers said they had not seen much evidence of such tactics since Yusuf’s death, but the Mercy Corps study found this practice of offering business incentives has continued.

“We did speak with several former members who joined post-2009 who were at least partially influenced or coerced by the offer of business support,” study author Lisa Inks told The WorldPost.

The study demonstrates how Boko Haram, like extremist groups around the world, has multiple ways to attract, intimidate and coerce recruits, including exploiting the socioeconomic and political grievances of the area.

“People are attracted by the violent ideology and by their legitimate grievances against the state,” Comolli said. “You feel like you are somebody when you are given a gun and a mission.”

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/boko-haram-recruitment-tactics_us_571265afe4b06f35cb6fc595

Remove the bastard abeg NOT because of him foreign wife but wearing jeans on an African throne. Is he mad?!

When IPOBs claim customized pen/pencil from China is made in 'Biafra' I try not to laugh but its hard very hard

But I thought they say white skin is superior to black

My name is Chukwudi am from Osun State

Why is this prince wearing sun glasses in the day time? Is he a musician?

suzziematini:
Is it just me or does IK ogbonna's marriage seem codedly open , and unnecessarily socialised. you need to check his page on Instagram and see nude and crazy pictures and videos of him and his wife forming "the perfect couple" girl seems to me like runs girl, guy seems to me like he dont care (just bring money) not saing thats whats going on, but following the nudity and sexuality they portray on social media, one has a good mind of thinking so. Your wife is foreign so?? Your wife has a good shape so??. Many celebs are married, and they mind their homes , respect their marriages and act decent....... little wonder he is struggling in the industry and accumulating despisers.

see busy body weyshin concern u?

The ONLY good thing this guy did in 6 years of Presidency was handing over to Buhari peacefully.

hemartins:
I used to think kings/obas don't travel. People Visit them to pay homage but now, everything is different.

That's why I will always respect the Oba Of Benin.

Which kind rule be that? The king na slave?!

Sctests:
Just tell me one thing that Kanu says that is false. Just one! Have you ever heard him speak? Can any of your generation be more skillful in oratory and eloquence than Activist Nnamdi Kanu?

Here is one: any tribe whose women wear a two piece wrapper is Biafran.

Sctests:
You are simply pained. International Researchers are talking and document Igbo I.Q while you are simply lamenting. Your inconsequential lamentations are music to my ears. LOL!

International Researchers Chai am trying not to laugh but you are making it difficult

VomeSchakleton:
classless and jobless!

I am not the one with the USELESS RELIGION E pain am

VomeSchakleton:
Seems you have an archive of pictures don't you? dweeb

Yes as long as you remain in your ignorance. Once again USELESS RELIGION

Impressive stuff. I wonder if the Yorubas are reaching out to their cousins in Togo, Benin, Ghana etc. So much can be achieved by that I presume.

No way. Adonbilivit

But FFK is ONLY watering the seeds that Dilector Kanu planted over many years. No be so?

NARCISSISTIC Yeeboos - the chestbeating no be 2day 0- No wonder nobody likes u

Look at all these busy bodies so students can't even fvck in peace again? And why should a University be regulating students' sexual activities? Is Kenya under that stupid thing called Sharia?

Nobleking2000:
Another hater from the waste how is the waste better than the east in terms of music talents.

This IPOB is denying the obvious so am trying hard not to laugh but its very hard walahi

Iyabo Ojo - my singular celebrity crush. My brockos tingles whenever I sight you

I DON'T CARE IF SHE IS WEARING A SACK OF RICE- SHE WILL ALWAYS BE MY CRUSH

Ikechu12781:
**** I don't even live in that country so how am I suffering from electoral defeat in an election I neither participated or voted in.

Just look at them. Whoever pays you APC rats should get his money back. You people are like a terrible broken record.

E be like say the thing pain you no be small See yourself below

The more I learn about this man the more I like (no homo) - He is truly the Lion of the South East (LSE)

NCAN members abeg u na food don don

VomeSchakleton:
Which friends? You think memes and pictures will hide your obvious stupidity? I'm familiar with the concept dumbo! I just don't see how it relates to the topic. Mo.ron.

This one says he does not see how church and state relates to the topic Chai

Once again USELESS RELIGION

Localamos:
I rep Rayfield. Where you at?

I think Jos NL should have a lounge on NL where we could hook up.

Long time ago I lived in Angulu-Jos not far from that biscuit factory (can't remember the name).