Regional armies struggle in last push against Boko Haram

-"You'll all be able to go home soon. Boko Haram is nearly finished," Niger's Interior Minister Mohamed Bazoum told a crowd of refugees seated quietly on dusty, sun-baked flats.



His words of optimism were belied by the dozens-strong security detail required to protect him as he toured his country's southern border.
Seven years into an insurgency that spread from Nigeria into Chad, Niger and Cameroon, regional armies are now in a final push to defeat Boko Haram, a once obscure Islamist sect turned deadly militant group.


But lingering divisions in the countries' multi-national joint task force (MNJTF) are complicating that mission.


"If there's no strategy to attack Boko Haram together, we won't ever finish with them," Mahamadou Liman Ali, an opposition lawmaker from southern Niger, told Reuters in Niamey.


At a time when the world's wealthy nations are focused on the fight against Islamic State and al Qaeda, financial support for the MNJTF's efforts against Boko Haram, which has pledged its allegiance to IS, have fallen short of targets.


That has left the task force's members - including Chad, the region's capable but increasingly reluctant military powerhouse - to shoulder the bulk of the costs of fighting the group.


Boko Haram's victims, which include 2.4 million displaced, live in hope that this month-old offensive - dubbed Operation Gama Aiki, or "finish the job" in the local Hausa language - might succeed where others have failed.


Some have doubts. From where he stays in southern Niger, refugee Usman Kanimbu sees smoke rising from the coalition's air strikes on insurgent positions in Nigeria, the home he fled.


"We've fled eight times. Each time we arrive somewhere Boko Haram attacks again. We would keep running, but we can't afford to anymore," he said. "I'm not sure this will ever end."



FRAGILE PROGRESS


As the sun sets over the Nigerian border, a featureless expanse of sand and scrub trees, soldiers from Niger peered over an earthen bern at territory held by Boko Haram.


The skies above the borderlands now rumble daily with the sound of fighter jets. Chadian troops have ventured onto Lake Chad, a Boko Haram stronghold. Regional military officers say they are taking back ground from the insurgents.


The task force may indeed be making headway against Boko Haram, which has fewer footholds than it once did. Its leader, Abubakar Shekau, may even be dead.


But the MNJTF is a far cry from what it was conceived to be, a dedicated 8,700-strong force blending soldiers from Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon, Chad and Benin.


Instead, the nations rely on their own armies to deal with Boko Haram threats. Troops from Chad, which has the region's strongest military, reinforce when needed then head back home.


"Each force is based in its country of origin. There's no integrated force with battalions moving in perfect coordination," said Vincent Foucher, West Africa researcher at International Crisis Group (ICG)