Musa Inuwa Kubo has had time on his hands. As education commissioner for Borno state, the centre of Nigeria’s Boko Haram insurgency, the government schools he oversees have been closed for nearly two years.
Now the reopening of 87 of them following President Muhammadu Buhari’s declaration that the Islamist militant group has been “degraded militarily” means Mr Kubo could become busier.
Government officials, aid agencies and residents say Maiduguri, Borno’s capital, is much safer than a year ago when the military offensive to push Boko Haram from the surrounding territory was launched. The challenge ahead is to rebuild the shattered state and help residents and the 1.6m people that the UN says were displaced to Maiduguri by the conflict return to a more normal life.
Before this can be done, Mr Kubo must assist in the relocation of the tens of thousands of displaced people living on Maiduguri’s school campuses. Many schools in the city have been turned into camps for those fleeing the militants. Though the Nigerian army has driven Boko Haram from most of the territory it seized in 2014, many towns and villages, some razed to the ground, are virtually deserted.
By contrast, Maiduguri, home to fewer than 1m before the insurgency, is crowded, its streets regularly clogged with traffic, often from military convoys. Residents stuck in cars or three-wheeled keke napeps live in fear of suicide bombers who target crowded areas.
Efforts are under way to bring the displaced people to more permanent centres, such as Dalori camp, on the city’s outskirts, already home to nearly 15,000. But there are concerns this is happening without the consent of the displaced people, says an aid worker who requested anonymity.
Nine camps are in schools due to be reclaimed, says Mr Kubo. Despite the knock-on effects, he believes reopening them is a priority in the battle against Boko Haram, which has declared war on western education.
He laments the “lost opportunity” for those whose parents could not afford private schools when state institutions were closed.
Poorly educated youth, with few prospects and time on their hands, are recruiting fodder for the Islamist group, which has killed at least 27,000 people in Nigeria in the past five years, according to a tally compiled by the US-based Council on Foreign Relations.
Franck Ndaie, head of office in Borno for Unicef, the UN children’s fund, says: “If we want to make a difference here in preventing Boko Haram, what we can do is focus on education.”
The rise of Boko Haram, or “western education is forbidden” in the Hausa language, is deeply connected with “poverty and illiteracy”, Mr Kubo says.
The group’s appeal to youth lacking opportunities was not recognised as a grave threat until it was too late, says another state official. “In under-developed societies like ours, it’s like Karl Marx said: ‘Religion is the opiate of the masses’.”
Boko Haram has targeted schools throughout the conflict, most notoriously in Chibok, a town south-west of Maiduguri, when more than 200 girls were abducted in 2014 from a boarding school in a raid that drew global attention to the terrorist group’s tactics.
For those who fled, the possibility of a life stable enough for their children to attend school remains a distant dream.
Maryam Mohamed Ali, 40, from Damboa, south-west of Maiduguri, was at home when militants stormed her town and shot dozens of men in the main square. She fled on foot to Maiduguri with some of her children and relatives.
“If there was the opportunity, I would like to send my children to school,” she says at a clinic where women can take their malnourished infants. “But I have no money for school fees or uniforms — there is not even enough to buy food.”
Fear still permeates Maiduguri, once a centre of Islamic learning and home to a respected secular university. After years of suicide bombings in markets, mosques and schools, nowhere is safe. Civilians are subject to intensive security checks. Women with babies are searched before they can enter clinics.
Boko Haram changes its tactics continually, with suicide bombers disguising themselves as beggars, water-carrying women and even guests at baby-naming ceremonies. “We used to live with our doors open and accept strangers. Now we tell our guards not to let anyone in,” says the official.
Issa Dawu, a bulama, or traditional leader, learnt that lesson last month when one of his wives, five of his children and several grandchildren, along with a number of neighbours, were killed when a woman came to his compound one evening asking for water.
“I was sceptical and wanted to know who she was, but my wife said, ‘you cannot say no’,” he recalls in a quiet voice. The woman detonated an explosive devise concealed under her abaya, a conservative gown, as she recited the Islamic declaration of faith known as the shahada.
Although the government’s push to reopen schools points to a better future, Mr Dawu fears Maiduguri has not seen the last of terrorism.
“We believed before that Boko Haram was becoming a bygone issue but then this happened,” he says of the attack. “All we can do is put our faith in God”.
BOX
Nigeria’s humanitarian crisis in numbers
⦁ 1.8m Internally displaced Nigerians forced from their homes by Boko Haram
⦁ 1m Children unable to attend school in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger due to attacks
⦁ At least 20 Deaths in the most recent suicide bomb attack in Maiduguri on December 28
⦁ 87 Secondary schools in Borno state closed due to insurgency
