NIGERIA: ANOTHER AFGHANISTAN?

Nigeria is a country that needs little or no introduction. A country that boasts to be the giant of Africa with over a hundred and eighty million people and obviously the most populous black nation in the world has had her ups and downs. From being an economic sleeping giant to a great tourist destination to a kidnappers' haven to the corruption capital of the world and now a terror stricken zone. Following is an incomplete list of the mayhem so far recorded in terms of terrorism:

2009 Boko Haram Uprising	July, 2009	Maiduguri, Bauchi, Potiskum, Wudil	1,000+	Islamic militants killed over a thousand people between 26 and 29 July; during the violence, Christians were killed for refusing to convert to Islam
2010 Jos massacre	2010	Jos	992	Religious rioting; victims were mostly Christians killed by Muslims
2011 Abuja United Nations bombing	August 26, 2011	Abuja	21	73 injured; Boko Haram attacked a United Nations compound
2011 Damaturu attacks	November 4, 2011	Damaturu	100-150	Islamic militants associated with Boko Haram attacked police stations, churches, and banks
December 2011 Nigeria clashes	December, 2011	Maiduguri and Damaturu	68+	Islamic militants associated with Boko Haram clashed with security forces between 22 and 23 December
December 2011 Nigeria bombings	December 25, 2011	Madalla	45	73 injured; Muslim militants bombed a Catholic church during Christmas mass
January 5-6, 2012 Nigeria attacks	January, 2012	Mubi, Yola, Gombi, and Maiduguri	37+	Islamic terrorists attacked churches and Christian businesses; Boko Haram claimed responsibility
January 20, 2012 Nigeria attacks	January 20, 2012	Kano	185	Islamic terrorists attacked churches and Christian businesses; Boko Haram claimed responsibility
April 2012 Kaduna massacre	April 8, 2012	Kaduna	38	Islamic terrorists bombed a church on Easter
June 2012 Kaduna church bombings	June 17, 2012	Kaduna, Wusasa, and Sabon Gari	12-19	80 injured; Islamic terrorists bombed three churches
July 2012 massacre	July 7, 2012	Multiple northern Nigerian villages	100+	Islamic militants attacked Christian villages
Deeper Life Church shooting	August 7, 2012	Okene	19	Islamic militants attacked a church; the pastor was among the dead

 December 25, 2012              Potiskum, Yobe   6         Gunmen attacked a church during christmas eve service

Is Nigeria going to be another Afganistan? Violence between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria is drawing the country ever closer to a religious war. The instigator of this conflict is Boko Haram, an Islamist movement whose very name means "Western education is forbidden."

The group was founded in 2002 in Maiduguri by Ustaz Mohammed Yusuf. In 2004 it moved to Kanamma, Yobe State, where it set up a base called "Afghanistan" used to attack nearby police posts killing police officers. If the Nigerian government can't stop this conflict from spiralling out of control, expect the United States to step in -- albeit with a relatively light hand -- to tip the scales against Boko Haram.

The situation in Nigeria hit a crisis point on June 17, when Boko Haram attacked three churches in Nigeria's north-central Kaduna state -- killing 21 people during services. Christians were quick to respond, and sectarian clashes ignited almost immediately. After four days of unrest, roughly 100 Nigerians lay dead.

Terrorist violence is nothing new for Boko Haram, a group that U.S. officials suspect of having links to Al Qaeda. As the U.S. State Department has noted, attacks by Boko Haram and associated militants have taken more than 1,000 lives over the past 18 months. Nor is sectarian strife new to Nigeria: The country, predominantly Muslim in the north and Christian in the south, has a history of sectarian violence in its religiously mixed middle belt. Past riots killed more than 100 people in 2002 -- again in Kaduna -- when Muslim youths protested the Miss World pageant being held in Nigeria, and they also claimed scores of lives in 2006 following Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten's publication of controversial cartoons satirising the Prophet Mohammed.
Recent events show that Boko Haram's attacks are only becoming more deadly. The organisation is in the midst of a tactical evolution: Whereas Boko Haram used to employ such tactics as assassinations and massed assaults on security forces, suicide bombings now feature prominently in its arsenal, and Christian targets -- which are most frequently attacked while church services are ongoing -- have moved to the top of the group's target list.
The Nigerian government has had some successes. Boko Haram was the target of violent suppression in July 2009 when its founder, Mohammed Yusuf, was summarily executed by Nigerian security forces following his capture that month, and roughly 800 members of the sect were killed, according to Nigerian military estimates. As scholar David Cook's useful study on Boko Haram details, however, the group re-emerged with a vengeance the following year. It engaged in "a high profile campaign of assassinations and attacks throughout northern Nigeria," Cook writes, and began to employ suicide attacks in the summer of 2011. Further, Cook notes, Boko Haram's attacks and threats have focused "more and more on interests that touch U.S. economic concerns in the region."
In line with Boko Haram's tactical evolution, it has frequently employed suicide bombings in its onslaught against Christian targets. Prior to the June 17 attacks, Boko Haram had perpetrated a number of other terrorist assaults on church services. On April 29, gunmen attacked services on Bayero University in the northern state of Kano, killing at least 16 people. The group also took credit for a June 3 suicide attack on a church in northeastern Nigeria that killed 15 people and wounded 40 more. The following Sunday, June 10, two church attacks rocked the cities of Jos and Biu, killing three people and wounding over 40. Once again, Boko Haram claimed responsibility. The latest attack on christmas eve 2012 has prompted Pope Benedict to use part of his Christmas message to the world on Tuesday to highlight the need for reconciliation in Nigeria, saying "savage acts of terrorism continue to reap victims, particularly among Christians".

Is Nigeria going to become another Afghanistan and does the Nigerian government and people have the will to stop this reign of terror or will they need international collaboration as spearheaded by the US in Afghanistan?