MS Risk Blog

Scores Killed In Nigerian President’s First Week in Office

As President Muhammadu Buhari marked his first week in office, the death toll from two blasts in northeastern Nigeria climbed to 35 on Friday, raising the total number killed in suspected Boko Haram attacks to 82.

This week’s violence comes as President Buhari embarked on his first foreign trip since taking office, visiting neighbouring Chad and Niger, which along with Cameroon, are Nigeria’s key allies in the battle against Boko Haram’s on going uprising. During his trip, Buhari urged closer regional security cooperation, while thanking troops from Nigeria’s neighbours for their efforts to date. The newly elected Nigerian president has vowed to crush the militant group, however last weeks spate of bombings has highlighted the severity of the challenge.

Two blasts rocked northeastern Nigeria on Thursday, killing at least six people, just hours before President Muhammadu Buhari urged closer regional cooperation to defeat Boko Haram. According to officials, the first explosion occurred in the Borno state capital Maiduguri, which has been hit by a spate of bombings in recent days. The incident occurred when a truck carrying firewood rammed into a checkpoint outside a military barracks. Police and locals have reported that at least four soldiers were killed in this explosion, which one resident called a “suicide attack.” The second blast occurred at a busy market in Yola, the capital of neighbouring Adamawa state. At least two people were killed in the second incident and some 30 others were injured. While there was no claim of responsibility, both incidents will likely be blamed on Boko Haram. Just hours before these latest attacks, President Buhari arrived in Chad’s capital N’Djamena, for talks with his counterpart Idriss Deby on tackling Boko Haram. According to a statement from the office of the Chadian President, Deby has “reaffirmed Chad’s involvement and availability” to work with Nigeria.

At least eleven people were killed Wednesday in an explosion in Maiduguri. According to Danlami Ajaokuta, a civilian vigilante assisting that military against Boko Haram in the Baga Road area, “we have so far recovered six dead bodies. We are still working at the scene, so the casualties may rise.” Ajaokuta indicated that the blast, which occurred at 5:30 PM (1630 GMT), happened at a garage opposite a military unit and it appeared to have been caused by explosives that were left nearby. Since last Friday, Maiduguri, which has been a regular target for Boko Haram Islamists, has been hit four times.

On Tuesday, suspected Boko Haram militants launched a renewed attack on Maiduguri, just days after the military repelled an assault on the key city. At least thirteen people were killed Tuesday in a suicide attack at a busy cattle market in the northeastern city of Maiduguri. According to Red Cross officials and locals, the blast in the Borno state capital occurred at around 1:00PM (1200 GMT) as traders were wrapping up business for the day. The northeast spokesman of the Nigerian Red Cross, Umar Sadiq, indicated that there were 13 dead and 24 injured who were taken to two city hospitals for treatment. While there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the latest attack, it bore the hallmarks of the group, with one official indicated that the victims were “carefully targeted,” adding “the bomber chose the most crowded part of the market and set off his bombs.” The attack came after Boko Haram militants again targeted Maiduguri with rocket-propelled grenades in the early hours of Tuesday after hitting the city in a similar attack on Saturday. Residents reported that the militants arrived in the Moronti area of the city by river during the early hours of Tuesday however they were unable to advance further because of wide ditches and embankments that were dug by soldiers around the city limits. According to locals, the militants then began shelling Ajillari Cross, which is located about three kilometres (2 miles) away. One local stated, “we were bombarded by RPG’s (rocket-propelled grenades) by Boko Haram from Moronti…We all left our homes for fear of being hit inside. It was dark so we could see the trajectory of the RPG’s, which were red with heat… Soon afterwards, we saw troops in trucks moving towards Moronti and then a fighter jet also deployed not long afterwards.”

Political and Civil Turmoil in Macedonia

Political infighting between Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’s government and the largest opposition party in the country, the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM), remains the dominant topic in Macedonia’s political life this month. However, it would appear that an end to political turmoil in the country could be in sight. Following last month’s ongoing political and civil unrest, which resulted in violent protests, clashes between protesters and police, and the resignation of government officials, Western powers have intervened in the crisis in the hope to broker a deal between the warring factions to solve the country’s political and civil unrest.

Throughout 2015, the Social Democrat opposition party has alleged that the current government, led by Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, as well as other senior members of his government, have participated in undemocratic practices, large-scale illegal surveillance, and widespread corruption. Since the opposition party, led by Zoran Zaev, launched its aggressive campaign to expose the government’s corrupt behavior earlier this year, the party has continually exposed dossiers of incriminating information on senior members of Gruevski’s government, as well as a lengthy series of wiretapped conversations, which the opposition claim is proof that the government has been involved in a wide range of corrupt actions, including electoral fraud and abuse of the justice system.

The ongoing political turbulence has lead to nation-wide public outcry, civil unrest, and mass protests. The political and civil strife has resulted in substantial amount of arrests and violent clashes between police and protesters. Notably, a mass protest of an estimated 60,000 people took place on May 17 in Macedonia’s capital, Skopje, in front of the government building. The protest was held in opposition to the Prime Minister and his administration, calling for Gruevski’s resignation and an end to the government’s widespread corruption. The protesters also demanded the formation of a transitional government, which they believe would enable the country to prepare for free and fair elections. The mass protest was organized by opposition parties and supported by many non-government organizations, rights movements, as well as Macedonian students and Unions. Other protests also took place throughout last month, with protesters continually gathering outside of the government building in Skopje.

Most recently, Macedonia’s opposition published new wiretapped conversations claiming to show that top officials, including the Prime Minister Gruevski and Interior Minister, Gordna Jankuloska, had plotted to hide official responsibility of the murder of a young man by a policeman in 2011. Gruevski, Jankuloska, and the rest of the government deny all claims. However, as the political and civil unrest and unrelenting large-scale protests continued last month, Interior Minister Gordana Jankuloska, the Chief of the Secret Police, Saso Mijalkov, and Transportation Minister, Mile Janakieski subsequently resigned.

Prime Minister Gruevski’s and opposition leader Zaev’s ongoing political battle has also resulted in the Prime Minister’s allegations that the leader of the opposition party is attempting to blackmail him and execute a coup. As of June 1, Zaev is now awaiting a 15-day decision period, as a Court in Skopje decides whether to proceed with criminal charges against him, as he stands accused of trying to blackmail the Prime Minister into resigning.

What is more, as the political battle between Macedonia’s government and the opposition rages on into June and calls for the resignation of Prime Minister Gruevski, as well as his entire government continue to grow, crisis talks have been held in the country, led by EU Enlargement Commissioner, Johannes Hahn, as Western powers attempt to broker a deal between Gruevski and Zaev to put an end to the country’s political strife. The crisis talks appear to be successful, as the EU Enlargement Commissioner has extracted an agreement between the government and the opposition on a transition period leading up to early elections that must take place before April 2016. It is not yet known whether Gruevski will continue as Prime Minister until the snap elections take place, amidst mounting for his resignation. However, it appears hopeful that the political and resulting civil unrest will begin to stabilize relatively soon as the run up to fresh elections begins.

Ebola Update (4 June 2015)

On Tuesday, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned that as long as there is one Ebola case in the West African region “all countries are at risk,” urging all nations to support the final battles aimed at wiping out the deadly disease in Guinea and Sierra Leone.

Speaking to a General Assembly meeting on efforts to end the Ebola epidemic, which has killed over 11,100 people mainly in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, the UN chief stated, “we are on the home stretch now and what happens now is critical.” While Liberia, which was once the worst affected country, has now been declared Ebola-free, Ban has warned that in Guinea and Sierra Leone, “the battle has not yet been won,” and “any lapse in vigilance could allow the virus to spread.” Dr David Nabarro, the UN Ebola chief, told the assembly that the priority is to ensure that the outbreak ends as soon as possible, “which will take several weeks and may take a number of months… But everybody should be ready in case the disease recurs and needs to be controlled, especially in the coming 12 months.” Ban also disclosed that UN agencies who will be taking over responsibility for tackling the outbreak as the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Repose (UNMEER) scales down “will need considerable resources to go the distance and support recovery” in the three hardest-hit countries. UNMEER’s acting chief Peter Jan Graaff has indicated that UNMEER’s office in Mali closed on 31 March while its office in Liberia has handed over its operations to the UN country team. The Sierra Leone office is expected to end operations by the end of June, with Graaff indicating, “UNMEER could complete its transition by July 31 and be closed by the end of August,” noting however that if the situation deteriorates, the timeline could be changed “to ensure that the UN’s political leverage and convening power is maintained.” The UN Secretary General has indicated that he will convene an International Ebola Recovery Conference in New York on 10 July, which will aim to mobilize resources to start early recovery in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

On Wednesday, the World Health Organization (WHO) released its latest figures on the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. As of 31 May, there have been a total of 27,145 reported confirmed, probable and suspected cases of EVD in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, with 11,147 reported deaths. In the seven days leading up to 31 May, a total of 25 confirmed cases of EVD were reported from 4 prefectures in Guinea and 3 districts of Sierra Leone,

According to the WHO, “since the week ending 10 May, when a 10-month low of 9 cases of Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) were reported from 2 prefectures of Guinea and 1 district of Sierra Leone, both the intensity and geographical area of EVD transmission have increased.” In the 7 days leading up to 31 May, a total of 13 new confirmed cases were reported in Guinea and 12 in Sierra Leone, with officials indicating that several cases in both countries arose from unknown sources of infection in areas that have not reported confirmed EVD cases for several weeks. This effectively indicates that chains of transmission continue to go undetected. Officials have noted that “rigours contact tracing, active case finding, and infection prevention and control must be maintained at current intensive levels in order to uncover and break every chain of transmission,” and have warned that the onset of the rainy season will make field operations more difficult from now onwards.

Two response teams from Guinea-Bissau have been deployed to the border with Guinea to assess several points of entry and sensitive communities. This is due to the proximity to Guinea-Bissau of the recent cluster of cases that have been reported in the northwestern Guinean prefecture of Boke. So far, the investigation team has not been able to locate the contact who had attended the funeral of a case in Boke and who is believed to have returned to a fishing community in Guinea-Bissau.

Guinea

In the week leading up to 31 May, a total of 13 cases were reported in 4 western prefectures of Guinea.

Seven of these cases were reported from the prefecture of Forecariah, which borders Sierra Leone. Multiple chains of transmission gave rise to cases in 4 of Forcariah’s 10 sub-prefectures, however all cases were either registered contacts of a previous case or had an established epidemiological link to one. Five cases were concentrated in the central areas of the prefecture where the sub-prefectures of Farmoriah, Kaliah, and Moussayah intersect. The remaining cases were reported from the northwestern prefecture of Boke (1 case), which borders Guinea-Bissau; the west coast prefecture of Dubreka (4 cases), which borders the capital city Conakry; and the western inland prefecture of Fria (1 case). The cases in Boke and Dubreka were all registered contacts of cases linked to localized chains of transmission. The case that was reported in Fria however arose from an unknown source and is suspected to have originated from an as-yet unidentified chain of transmission in the neighbouring prefecture of Telimele. Officials have indicated that investigations into the origin of the case in Fria have been complicated by active and passive resistance from communities both in Fria and neighbouring Telimele.

On the ground sources in Guinea have reported that community engagement continues to prove challenging, particularly in all the 4 affected prefectures. There have been several reported incidents of violence that has been directed at field staff during the past week.

Sierra Leone

In the week leading up to 31 May, Sierra Leone reported a total of 12 cases in three districts.

Eight of these cases were reported from a densely populated area of the Kaffu Bullom chiefdom in the district of Port Loko, which is located just north of the capital, Freetown. All but one of these cases were registered contacts of previous cases within quarantined houses in the chiefdom. The additional case is from the same neighbourhood however it was not on a contact list and was living in a non-quarantined home at the time of symptom onset. The other cases were reported in the following districts: Kambia reported its first case for over 2 weeks on 31 May. The case was identified after a post-mortem test of a community death and was not a known contact of a previous case. The remaining three cases were reported from the capital city, Freetown. Officials in Freetown have indicated that at this time, none of those 3 cases can be linked to previous chains of transmission however investigations are at an early stage.

Libya Against UN Action To Prevent Migrant Smugglers from Operating in Mediterranean

Libya’s ambassador to the United Nations indicated Tuesday that his government is refusing to give its consent for UN action, which is aimed at endorsing Europe’s military plan to fight migrant smugglers in the Mediterranean.

According to Ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi, “the position of Libya is clear: as long as the European Union and some other countries are not dealing with the legitimate government as the sole representative of the Libyan people, they will not get any consent on our part.” The remarks come after EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini appeared before the UN Security Council last month to request UN backing for Europe’s plan to confront the migrant crisis by using military force against smugglers. The Security Council’s EU members – Britain, France, Lithuania and Spain – are currently working with Italy on a draft resolution that would effectively endorse the EU naval force, authorizing the use of force in Libyan territorial waters. However the resolution requires the Libyan government to first give its consent for the operations, which could also take place on its costal territory.

While Libya’s internationally recognized government has been driven out of Tripoli, it is now based in the eastern city of Tobruk. The UN has been for months working to broker an agreement on a new national unity government. Last week, the Tobruk government sent an envoy to Brussels. Foreign Minister Mohamed al-Dayri was at the EU’s headquarters this week, where he attended talks on the EU plan. Despite these meetings, however Dabbashi has made it clear that a letter of consent was not forthcoming, stating, “I think the resolution will never come out.” While the Ambassador did acknowledge that the new EU naval force can act in the Mediterranean without Security Council endorsement, he warned “there are consequences,” adding “I don’t think they will go too far without the Security resolution.”

Since the fall of Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, Libya has been engulfed in fighting and over the past several years, the country has developed into a staging ground for smugglers who load rickety boats with refugees and migrants desperate to reach Europe. So far this year, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) has indicated that some 1,770 migrants have perished on the hazardous journey to Europe, effectively a 30-fold increase on the same period in 2014. Over the past eighteen months, more than 5,000 people have died. Security Council diplomats have privately admitted that European efforts to present a resolution on the migrant crisis have hit a wall over Libya’s refusal to grant them approval. Sources have disclosed that European governments had instructed their diplomats, most of home are based in Tunis, to reach out to the various Libyan factions in a bid to try to get them onboard the plan prior to formally presenting the draft resolution at the Security Council.

Nigerian President Announces First Official Trip

On Monday, a spokesman for President Muhammadu Buhari announced that the newly elected president will this week make his first foreign trip since taking office.

Newly elected President Buhari is due to travel to neighboring Niger on Wednesday and to Chad on Thursday. Niger shares a border with Borno and Yobe states while Chad borders Borno state in Nigeria’s extreme northeast. According to Shehu Garba, the two-day trip will focus on “maters of security,” with the cooperation of Nigeria’s neighbors seen as being critical to ending the militant uprising, which since 2009 has claimed more than 15,000 lives.

President Buhari was sworn in last Friday and during his inaugural speech, he vowed to crush the insurgent group, which he described as “mindless” and “godless.” Despite this vow, Boko Haram carried out an attack some twelve hours after the new president took the oath of office, targeting homes in the key northeastern city of Maiduguri. Overnight on Saturday, the militants stormed the city, launching rocket-propelled grenades. Later, a suicide attack at a mosque in the city, which is the Borno state capital, killed at least twenty-six people and injured dozens others. On Sunday, the militants raided two towns in Borno’s neighboring state of Yobe, where they torched public buildings and looted food and fuel stores.

While former president Goodluck Jonathan’s administration had previously complained that Nigeria’s neighbors were not doing enough in order to contain Boko Haram, as in some instances, the militants were able to flee military pursuit by crossing porous borders, a four-nation offensive launched in February, and which includes troops from Cameroon, has won significant victories, however there are growing fears that Boko Haram may be regrouping, particularly in the remote border areas which are difficult to patrol. In turn, both Chad and Niger have complained of a lack of cooperation from Nigeria, which has strained relations with all its neighbors. Chadian troops have also had to retake some towns from Boko Haram several times as Nigerian troops haven’t arrived in order to secure them.