Extremists are penetrating sub-Saharan Africa at an alarming rate, threatening states ill-prepared to deal with the resulting complex social and security challenge, western and African officials have said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Islamic radical groups, which include Isis<\/a>, Al Qaeda<\/a> affiliates and homegrown movements such as Boko Haram, threaten the continent \u2013 despite recent defeats at the hands of African armed forces. The encroachment poses unique challenges for policymakers and officials of shaky governments struggling with limited resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe extremists are inside the community \u2013 they provide public services where the state has failed,\u201d said\u00a0Bineta\u00a0Diop, an official of the African Union. Speaking to\u00a0The Independent<\/em>\u00a0last week at a conference in Marrakesh, Morocco, called Atlantic Dialogues, she added: \u201cThey bring water, sanitation, education. They provide opportunities to young people they don\u2019t otherwise have. There is a need to address the basics elements of human security and not leave it to extremists.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Major General Christopher Craige, of the US military branch Africa Command, attributed the rise in radicalism in the continent to \u201clack of strong governments, lack of government services, lack of opportunities\u201d. Speaking at the sidelines of the conference, which was organised by the Moroccan think tank Policy Centre for the New South, he added that extremism was also spreading because \u201cEurope, Africa, and the Middle East are now so connected \u2013 not just because of modern media devices, but because of travel\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Statistics<\/a>\u00a0show that terrorist incidents in the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe fell last year, while sub-Saharan Africa held steady, suggesting a shift in focus towards Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEverything is going south,\u201d said Rida Lyammouri<\/a>, a researcher at the Policy Centre for the New South, describing militant groups\u2019 expansion in Mali and Burkina Faso. \u201cIt\u2019s very alarming. The conflicts have spread.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Extremist groups infiltrating sub-Saharan Africa often take a different approach to those drawing supporters in European or Arab cities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Scholars increasingly find it useful to distinguish between radicalisation in urban spaces such as in Europe, or along the Mediterranean coast of North Africa, and rural spaces such as in Mali or rural Nigeria, where radical global aims become fused with local grievances. Countering violent extremism in each area requires different approaches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe militant groups in Mali and other places can easily find social empowerment by connecting to tribes or ethnic groups, and make common interest with the community,\u201d said Mostafa Rezrazi, president of the Moroccan Observatory for Extremism and Violence. \u201cAt that point, it becomes quite difficult to fight them just as criminals.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr Lyammouri, who spent a number of months in 2013 and 2014 conducting research among radicalised villagers living along the Niger River in Mali, found that militants often began infiltration by co-opting local leaders and offering help with agriculture and other services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s more than just radicalisation or ideology,\u201d he said, in a presentation to former diplomats, researchers, and journalists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSome of the youth joined did it for money, some joined for ideology. Some joined because they had no other option. There was no state. The groups were providing services that the state wasn\u2019t providing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Eventually, the villages began to shun the state instead of begging for services, renaming their towns from local languages for Arabic equivalents, and choosing not to interact with non-radicalised towns. Local leaders were dispatched to Ghana or Ivory Coast to study conservative forms of Islam, and return to preach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey had a more conservative radical ideology and imposed some extremist ways of life,\u201d said Mr Lyammouri. \u201cMost of the communities were not educated \u2013 couldn\u2019t read or write \u2013 and were not able to challenge the preachers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why and at what point such communities or individuals within them choose to cross over into violence remains a question. One factor is the spread of violent messages via the internet. But perhaps more important are the mistakes made by governments that prod Islamist groups into violent resistance against the state.Support free-thinking journalism and subscribe to Independent Minds<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the French arrived in northern Mali to fight extremists in 2013, the Malian army accompanying them committed atrocities that continue to haunt relations between the state and the locals. The Islamist militant group Ansar al-Islam emerged in Burkina Faso after the armed forces committed atrocities. Even Boko Haram in Nigeria turned to systematic violence only after their supreme leader was summarily executed by security forces following a messy 2009 confrontation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Even more so than in Europe, Africa\u2019s prisons are threatening to become incubators of radicalism as ordinary prisoners sometimes caught up in dragnets by police are warehoused in harsh conditions with hardened jihadists seeking recruits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n African governments also sometimes commit needless blunders that damage their own anti-radicalisation aims. In an effort to stop the spread of Boko Haram, the Nigerian government cut off the road to Lake Chad, destroying the livelihoods of fishing communities, and making them susceptible to the group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Burkina Faso at one point sought to ban public prayer by Muslims, while Chad passed a law after a suicide bombing banning women from wearing face-covering Islamic garb. \u201cThese kinds of moves create a lot of anger towards governments,\u201d said Mr Lyammouri.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe militant groups have built a trust with the communities that\u2019s hard to break, that took a decade to build,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to take more than a decade to break that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Experts say governments need an approach that doesn’t rely solely on security forces but addresses local grievances Extremists are penetrating sub-Saharan Africa at an alarming rate, threatening states ill-prepared to deal with the resulting complex social and security challenge, western and African officials have said. Islamic radical groups, which include Isis, Al Qaeda affiliates and homegrown movements such as Boko Haram, threaten the continent \u2013 despite… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[127],"class_list":["post-2739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-www-independent-co-uk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2739"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2740,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2739\/revisions\/2740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/subsaharanafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}