POVERTY AND INSECURITY IN THE LAKE CHAD REGION

BORNO STATE OF NIGERIA (2011-2015) IN PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

Despite the vast research on insecurity in the Lake Chad region, little is known about the cause of the current insurgency. In many ways, there are substances and flaws in the three dominant competing narratives about insecurity and violence in the Nigerian portion of the Lake Chad region. Significantly, the study has engaged the three dominant theoretical perspectives explaining the root causes of the Boko-Haram violence in the region. The study elicited from some of the communities different perspectives on the cause of the decline in their socioeconomic activities and the widespread poverty and unemployment in the region. Two hundred and sixty (260) structured questionnaires and some selected interviews were used for three (3) local government areas; MMC, Abadam and Gwoza representing the three senatorial districts of Borno central, north and south respectively. This was supplemented by secondary data. A sequential analytical technique was used in the analysis and testing of the three widely held assumptions about insecurity in the region. While the study aligns with poverty and inequality theory, it found that in addition to the general poverty level in the Northeast, the downfall of agricultural activity which is the major economic activity in the Lake Chad region, the porous nature of the boundaries of countries of the Lake Chad Basin, the diversion of Lake Chad waters for irrigations by Cameroon and the socioeconomic and cultural linkages of the communities of Borno with the Arab Nations of North Africa, where conflict situation and insecurity prevails aftermath of the Arab Spring, have all contributed to the current security stalemate in the region. The study recommends an integrated regional security approach to checking cross-border crimes in the riparian region of Lake Chad. It also recommends that governments should embark on effective poverty alleviation and human capital development programs for youths to make up for the declining traditional economic activities in the region, which are farming, fishing and grazing. Also, that an improved security and immigration policy is needed for short term and even long term measure for shoring up of border security to control external flow of insurgents in the Lake Chad region.