Searching for Boko Haram: A History of Violence in Central Africa

249 Pages·2018·16.53 MB·English

by  Scott MacEachern

SEARCHING FOR BOKO HARAM

SEARCHING
FOR BOKO
HARAM
A History of Violence
in Central Africa
Scott MacEachern
1
1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: MacEachern, Scott, author.
Title: Searching for Boko Haram : a history of violence in Central Africa / Scott MacEachern.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2018. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017049317 (print) | LCCN 2017056111 (ebook) | ISBN 9780190492533 (updf) |
ISBN 9780190492540 (epub) | ISBN 9780190492526 (cloth : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Boko Haram. | Terrorist organizations—Nigeria. |
Terrorism—Nigeria—Religious aspects—Islam. | Insurgency—Nigeria.
Classification: LCC HV643.N62 (ebook) | LCC HV643.N62 .B657 2018 (print) |
DDC 363.32509669—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017049317
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
CONTENTS
1. Introduction 1
Boko Haram: A primer 6
Historical and cultural frameworks 16
The lands and people of the southern
Lake Chad Basin 20
The weight of history in Africa 24
A note about terminology 27
2. Deep time, modern consequences 29
Canoes and the Green Sahara 31
Refugee encounters 34
Difference and assimilation 37
The dynamics of difference 39
Archaeological correlates 41
The spread of iron and politics 43
Deep histories in the Lake Chad
Basin 50
3. Frontiers: Mountains and plains 53
Dichotomies of place 55
Contents
vi
Processes of mountain settlement 59
Water, ritual, and theater 65
The advent of states in the Lake Chad
Basin 69
Making frontiers: Montagnards and
plainsmen 79
4. States, frontiers, and enslavement 83
Slaves without gold 88
Fields of empire 91
Sun Kings and Janus- faced sovereigns 98
Ideologies 102
Making the plains 106
Hamman Yaji redux 114
5. Kalashnikovs, cell phones, and
motorcycles 117
Zoua- zoua and coupeurs de route 126
“The man in the car” 136
The borders of social life 142
Melgwa and banditry 148
6. Placing Boko Haram 153
Terror in the name of God 154
Ethnicity and ethnic relations 157
Borders, wealth, and status 166
Gris- gris and kingmakers 175
Putting Boko Haram in context 183
7. Pasts, parallels, and the future 187
Reprise: Timescales 189
Reprise: States, people, and violence 194
Contents
vii
Reprise: Boko Haram on the borders 197
Songs of smugglers and bandits 199
The future 204
List of figures 211
Acknowledgments 213
Notes 215
References 217
Index 227

1
INTRODUCTION
Westerners often assume that the lands of Boko Haram are remote
and inaccessible, but getting to that part of Africa is actually fairly
straightforward, in good times at least. Perhaps the easiest route
starts with an Air France flight from Paris to Yaoundé, the capital of
Cameroon, down in the forests in the south of the country. Those
flights usually arrive late in the afternoon, so the next day a traveler
would board the ninety-m inute Cameroon Airlines flight for Maroua,
the political and commercial center of Extreme North Province,
about 135 miles (220 kilometers) south of Lake Chad and close to
the Nigerian border. From there, they would need to hire a car and a
driver from one of the local tour operators, taking the road out of town
toward the Mandara Mountains, sprawling low on the horizon to the
west. The road is paved, albeit badly, and the drive to the interna-
tional border usually takes about four hours— or it did, at least, before
terrorism and violence intervened.
In the plains that stretch between Maroua and the mountains, the
highway winds through bustling villages surrounded by fields of sor-
ghum and cotton, the roads crowded with farmers and travelers and
made hazardous by potholes and some of the most stubborn donkeys
on Earth. The twisting ascent up into the Mandara Mountains starts
at the village of Mokong, close to a UN camp for refugees from the
conflict with Boko Haram called Minawao that now holds about sixty