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Boko Haram recruited three local gangs in northwestern Nigeria to kidnap hundreds of schoolchildren on their behalf, local and security sources said on Wednesday.
The jihadist group has claimed responsibility for Friday’s attack, which targeted a secondary school in the city of Kankara, in Katsina state.
But sources told AFP that the operation was carried out on the orders of Boko Haram by a notorious local gangster named Awwalun Daudawa.
The 43-year-old worked in collaboration with Idi Minorti and Dankarami, two other crime bosses with strong local supporters, they said.
Criminal gangs, known as bandits, have terrorized communities in northwestern Nigeria for years, and experts had recently warned of attempts by jihadists to forge an alliance with them.
Daudawa “was an armed robber and cattle thief before engaging in arms trafficking, bringing arms from Libya, where he had received training, and selling them to bandits,” said a security source.
“Over time, he forged an alliance with Boko Haram and became their arms dealer, taking the weapons the group confiscated from the Nigerian security forces in raids and ambushes and selling them to bandits for a cut.”
The source added: “Awwalun Daudawa was seen in the forest in the Kankara area where he recently moved and there were reports that he was planning something, but it was not clear what it was.”
Another source with intimate knowledge of the activities of the “bandits” in Katsina and Zamfara states said: “Based on the information available, Abubakar Shekau ordered Awwalun Daudawa to kidnap the school children and had the help of Idi Minorti and Dankarami “.
“After the children were taken, they crossed the border into Zamfara state and divided them between different gangs ‘to keep them safe.’ And some of the gangs have contacted the authorities for the release of the children. “.
The attack occurred hundreds of kilometers (miles) from the Boko Haram stronghold in northeastern Nigeria, where it launched a brutal insurgency a decade ago.
The jihadists made a claim of responsibility in a four-minute audio, sent to AFP through the same channel as the group’s previous messages.
“I am Abubakar Shekau and our brothers are behind the kidnapping in Katsina,” said the voice on the recording, similar to that of the elusive Boko Haram leader.
‘Contacts’
Shekau was behind the 2014 kidnapping of 276 schoolchildren in Chibok that sparked worldwide outrage, but another source said the two incidents were not immediately comparable.
“There is an ongoing peace pact between the bandits and (the) Zamfara state government that the bandits do not want to violate. They have been under intense pressure to release the children,” the source said.
Parents wait outside the Government Science High School in Kankara, where hundreds of pupils were abducted. By (AFP) “This situation makes Kankara’s abduction different from that of the Chibok schoolgirls who were directly in the custody of Boko Haram. This time, the bandits who keep the children have the ace, not Shekau.
Katsina State Governor Aminu Bello Masari said late Monday that the kidnappers “have made contacts with the government.”
“Talks are ongoing to ensure their safety and return to their respective families,” he said on Twitter.
The government has not immediately reacted to Boko Haram’s claim or confirmed its authenticity, and the number of missing students remains unclear: 320 or 333, according to two versions of officials, while the inhabitants of Kankara estimate it at more of 500.
