Islamist militants have significantly stepped up their attacks in Niger in the months since generals ousted the elected president, questioning co-operation with the US and withdrawing anti-terrorism support for French troops, according to The Washington Post.
Niger has long been a reliable ally for Europe and Washington – a measure of the success of democracy in a coup-plagued region, a key ally in the fight against Islamic extremism and a counterweight to Russia’s growing regional influence. The coup in late July, however, disrupted all this stable construct.
But the coup leaders have increasingly withdrawn into isolation from their former allies, riding a wave of anti-French sentiment that has spread through France’s former West African colonies. Aiming its fury mainly at France, the new government forced the French ambassador and 1,500 French troops to leave the country.
The coup leaders also expelled the chief UN diplomat from the country. However, their revolutionary actions did not stop there. They took such an intransigent stance in negotiations that the US, which has a drone base and about 1,000 soldiers in northern Niger, suspended all assistance to the Nigerian military.
According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), incidents targeting civilians by the Sahel branch of the Islamic State have quadrupled in the month since the coup. Also in recent months, dozens of soldiers have been killed in attacks blamed on ISIS and the al-Qaeda-affiliated group Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM). Ibrahim Yahaya Ibrahim, deputy director of the International Crisis Group’s Sahel project, said:
Though they are trying to show otherwise, the Nigerien military is weakened. The coup is good news for the jihadist groups.
Ibrahim believes the drawdown of French soldiers, who began leaving the country this month, will create a “significant vacuum” in the country’s defence. This comes at the same time as Nigerian troops are straining to defend their borders against a possible invasion by neighbouring countries demanding the return to power of President Mohamed Bazoom, who remains in detention along with his family, The Washington Post reports.
US Defence Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal analyses, said:
Overall, we are likely to see the situation continue to deteriorate, at the current or accelerating rate. On the terrorist side, we see few barriers to growth.
A similar escalation of violence has occurred in neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso following military coups in those countries in 2021 and 2022 respectively. However, in Niamey, many residents say they expect the violence and economic hardship to pass. Maria Saley, a 39-year-old activist from the Goudel district, says that at this “decisive or turning point” her country and the whole continent are realising that they “must say no to the West”.
Saley said, while sitting in an office where there is no light due to the power shortage that has engulfed the country after power supplies from neighbouring Nigeria were cut off:
There is always violence before there is peace. We have total confidence in our military leaders.
General Abdourahmane Tchiani, who was longtime head of the presidential guard, said the “harsh reality of insecurity in Niger” prompted his coup.
Africa’s Sahel region, which runs across the continent under the Sahara Desert and includes Niger, has become a global hotspot for Islamist extremism in recent years, accounting for 43 per cent of the 6,701 deaths in 2022, up from 1 per cent in 2007, according to the Global Terrorism Index compiled by the Institute for Economics and Peace.
In Niger itself, however, the death toll has declined over the past two years, with the number of deaths due to political violence many times lower than in Mali and Burkina Faso, according to ACLED. Analysts say this is due to Niger’s strong armed forces, counterterrorism assistance from France and the U.S., and Bazoum’s successful efforts to establish dialogue with local extremist groups, including the demobilization of combatants, according to The Washington Post.
After the military came to power, the trend reversed, with the death toll rising sharply in August. Analysts and Western officials say it is unlikely that extremist groups have stepped up their activities precisely because of the political situation in Niger, but the Nigerian military’s ability to counter them has come into question.
Daniel Eizenga, a researcher at the African Centre for Strategic Studies specialising in the Sahel, said the French military’s removal limits Niger’s ability to respond to attacks at a time when the situation is getting “exponentially worse”. He said:
It seems like they [juntas in Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali] are scoring on their own goal. Their first move because they are hoping to secure political points is demonize one of their biggest partners, and that means they are hurting their ability to confront the threats staring them down.
After Mali dislodged French troops, it turned to Russia for help, which sent armed contractors from the Wagner Group to the country in 2021. At the same time, Burkina Faso’s president has spoken publicly in recent months about a possible military partnership with Russia.
Nigerian government officials, without citing evidence, accuse France of escalating the violence. They claim the former colonial power is seeking to destabilise the country. A senior French official said that at the request of Niger’s leadership before the coup, France was working with the Nigerian army as a partner and Nigerians were leading the operations, The Washington Post reports.
Shortly after the coup, the US suspended a number of counterterrorism operations and joint activities with the Nigerian military, said a senior State Department official who, like other officials, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation. The Pentagon has withdrawn some troops and concentrated the remaining ones at bases in Agadez and Niamey. The French, meanwhile, have halted military operations.
Analysts and officials say that although riven by internal strife, the junta has been able to mobilise the support of many Nigerians, hundreds of whom gather at night at the military airfield waving Nigerian flags as well as those of Russia, Mali and Burkina Faso. These demonstrators hail the government’s decision to withdraw the French military and say Bazoum and his predecessor Mahamadou Issoufou were too close to the country’s former colonisers.
