Religious Extremism in Northern Nigeria Past and Present: Parallels between the Pseudo-Tijanis and Boko Haram

Abstract

This paper has three main objectives. The first is to contribute to the process, which is being pursued by an increasing number of scholars with ever greater urgency, of mapping Boko Haram. The second is to make the point that, while Boko Haram might be unique, it is not the first Islamic group to spring from or operate in northern Nigeria, to the alarm of either the country’s government or the international community. The third is to highlight a historical paradox: the Tijaniyya’s shift from suspect to ally. To achieve these ambitions, the paper compares Boko Haram with what the British authorities in Nigeria in the 1920s described as the pseudo-Tijanis. More specifically, it points to: their complicated organisational structures; their links to other groups and bodies elsewhere in the Islamic world; and the difficult and delicate positions in which their actions placed the North’s traditional leaders.

Keywords:

• Boko Haram
• pseudo-Tijanis
• Tijaniyya
• Waziri
• Sultan of Sokoto
• northern Nigeria
• Maiduguri
• Kaduno
• Kano
• Zaria
• salafism
• Goodluck Jonathan

Acknowledgement

The author is indebted to Sophie Hague for all the help and advice she has provided in writing this paper.

Notes

1. The battle of Maiduguri was an armed confrontation between Boko Haram and the Nigerian security forces. It began on 26 July 2009 in the city of Bauchi when police officers tried to fine members of the group for not wearing helmets while riding motorcycles. The fight that broke out quickly escalated and spread to Maiduguri, the faction’s main base, before shifting again to the nearby towns of Potsikum and Wudil. Order was finally restored on 2 August 2009. Most of the heaviest fighting took place in Maiduguri during the brief siege soldiers and police officers lay to the group’s main compound. Even though the fighting lasted for less than a week it resulted in the deaths of over 800 people. Most of those killed were Boko Haram members, but the slain also included soldiers and police officers, and bystanders. Amnesty International (2012) Nigeria: Trapped in the Cycle of Violence, p. 7, http://www.amnesty.ca/sites/default/files/nigeriareport1november12.pdf, accessed 10 April 2013.

2. Certainly this is the opinion of the head of the United States military’s Africa Command (AFRICOM), General Carter Ham. BBC (2012) ‘Africa’s Islamist militants “co-ordinate efforts”’, 26 June, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18592789, accessed 14 August 2012. General Ham’s claims and wider US concerns about Boko Haram’s links have been reported by Human Rights Watch. Human Rights Watch (2012) Spiralling Violence: Boko Haram Attacks and Security Force Abuses in Nigeria, October, pp. 89–91, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/nigeria1012webwcoverLowerRes.pdf, accessed 10 April 2013.

3. By the time the British authorities in Nigeria were becoming concerned by the presence of these missionaries French Sudan had been in existence for four years after being re-established in 1920.

4. J. N. C. Hill (2010) Sufism in Northern Nigeria: A Force for Counter-radicalisation? (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute).

5. Salafists believe that Sufi ‘practices and traditions [are] alien to Islam primarily because of their emphasis on intermediaries between God and Man, and [lead] to decadence and superstition’. Michael Willis (1996) The Islamist Challenge in Algeria: A Political History (Reading: Ithaca Press), p. 13.

6. US Department of State (2012) 2011 Human Rights Reports: Nigeria, 24 May, http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2011/af/186229.htm, accessed 10 October 2012.

7. The Minister of Information and Communication, Dora Akunyili, even went so far as to describe Yusuf’s death as ‘the best thing that could have happened to Nigeria’. The Telegraph (2009) ‘Nigeria welcomes death of “Taliban” leader’, 31 July, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/nigeria/5949453/Nigeria-welcoms-death-of-Taliban-leader.html, accessed 10 October 2012.

8. The Minister of Information and Communication, Dora Akunyili, even went so far as to describe Yusuf’s death as ‘the best thing that could have happened to Nigeria’. The Telegraph (2009) ‘Nigeria welcomes death of “Taliban” leader’, 31 July, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/nigeria/5949453/Nigeria-welcoms-death-of-Taliban-leader.html, accessed 10 October 2012.

9. The group has now carried out several attacks in Abuja, which is located in the dead centre of the country. BBC (2012) ‘Nigeria’s ThisDay newspaper hit by Abuja and Kaduna blasts’, 26 April, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-17856362, accessed 10 October 2012; Human Rights Watch (2012) Spiralling Violence: Boko Haram Attacks and Security Force Abuses in Nigeria, October, p. 18, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/nigeria1012webwcoverLowerRes.pdf, accessed 10 April 2013.

10. BBC (2012) ‘Nigeria Church bombed in Bauchi, Boko Haram flashpoint’, 23 September, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-19691781, accessed 10 October 2012.

11. Human Rights Watch (2012) Spiralling Violence: Boko Haram Attacks and Security Force Abuses in Nigeria, October , p. 93, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/nigeria1012webwcoverLowerRes.pdf, accessed 10 April 2013; The Telegraph (2012) ‘40 inmates freed in Nigeria jailbreak’, 24 June, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/nigeria/9352523/40-inmates-freed-in-Nigeria-jailbreak.html, accessed 10 October 2012.

12. New York Times (2011) ‘Suicide bomber attacks U.N. building in Nigeria’, 26 August, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/27/world/africa/27nigeria.html?pagewanted=all, accessed 27 April 2012; Human Rights Watch (2012) Spiralling Violence: Boko Haram Attacks and Security Force Abuses in Nigeria, October, p. 18, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/nigeria1012webwcoverLowerRes.pdf, accessed 10 April 2013.

13. Arewa House (1924) ‘From the Resident Zaria Province to the Secretary Northern Provinces: Tijani Movement’, 16 July, 1/27/204, p. 1.

14. Arewa House (1924) ‘From the Resident Zaria Province to the Secretary Northern Provinces: Tijani Movement’, 16 July, 1/27/204, p. 1.

15. Arewa House (1924) ‘From the Resident Zaria Province to the Secretary Northern Provinces: Tijani Movement’, 16 July, 1/27/204, pp. 1–2.

16. Britain formally established the Northern Nigeria Protectorate in 1900 just 83 years after the death of Usman dan Fodio, who was the first Sultan of the Sokoto Caliphate. John N. Paden (2005) Muslim Civic Cultures and Conflict Resolution: The Challenge of Democratic Federalism in Nigeria (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press), p. 253n. 5.

17. Arewa House (1924) ‘Tijani Movement’, 26 March, 1/27/204, pp. 1–5.

18. Arewa House (1924) ‘Tijani Missionaries in Nigeria’, 19 December, 1/27/204, p. 1.

19. Arewa House (1924) ‘Tijani Missionaries in Nigeria’, 19 December, 1/27/204, p. 1.

20. Richard Dowden (2012) Boko Haram—More Complicated than You Think, 9 March, http://www.royalafricansociety.org/component/content/article/992.html, accessed 16 October 2012.

21. Certainly this is what the US House of Representatives contends. US House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence (2011) Boko Haram: Emerging Threat to the U.S. Homeland, 30 November, http://homeland.house.gov/hearing/subcommittee-hearing-boko-haram-emerging-threat-us-homeland, accessed 22 May 2012.

22. Nur himself spent time studying in Sudan.

23. Indeed, for this assault to succeed Boko Haram needed: volunteers to drive the vehicle in which the bomb was packed; sufficient explosives to smash the building’s concrete walls; the technical expertise to build and prime a bomb of sufficient size; and the aptitude to conduct covert surveillance of the compound beforehand to identify any weaknesses in its defences. The success of this attack has all but confirmed international suspicions that Boko Haram is receiving help from outside the country. It was this attack that prompted the US House of Representatives to draft its report Boko Haram Emerging Threat to the U.S. Homeland.

24. Member of the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, interview by the author, London, 1 October 2012.

25. BBC (2011) ‘Riots over Goodluck Jonathan win’, 18 April, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13107867, accessed 16 October 2012; Reuters (2011) Bodies in Streets After Nigeria Election Riots, 19 April, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/19/us-nigeria-elections-idUSTRE73E8DO20110419, accessed 16 October 2012; Human Rights Watch (2011) Nigeria: Post-election Violence Killed 800, 17 May, http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/05/16/nigeria-post-election-violence-killed-800, accessed 16 October 2012.

26. The Guardian (2012) ‘Radical Nigeria sect threatens wives of leaders’, 1 October, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/10463621, accessed 8 October 2012.

27. BBC (2011) ‘Nigeria to probe “army abuses” in Boko Haram crackdown’, 12 August, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-14500986, accessed 10 October 2012.