FACED with threats from Boko Haram to overrun Borno State, the Defence Headquarters has directed the Special Force to keep an eye on Mandara, Mountains.
Gwoza and 1 Kirawa Hills are to be under surveillance.
Gwoza and Bama towns are under air and mobile patrol, The Nation learnt yesterday.
The Chief of Defence Staff, Admiral Ibrahim Ola Sa’ad, has sent an eight-man team to Borno State for on-the-spot assessment of the special operation and alleged fresh threats from Boko Haram.
Boko Haram, according to reports, has regrouped for reprisals against the Special Force and Multi-National Task Force(MNTF), which destabilised the sect’s base in 10 local government areas.
The regrouping of the sect members led to the killing of more than 16 people in the last one week in Borno and Yobe states. Eight teachers and students in a boarding secondary school in Damaturu, the Yobe State capital.
The Defence Headquarters, which is monitoring the resurgence of the sect, is said to have dispatched an eight-man team to Borno for stock-taking.
Boko Haram fighters have been driven away from Northern Borno, but military chief have got intelligence reports that they may regroup. “We are not taking things for granted,” a source said, adding:
“What they are trying to do is to shift base to Gwoza in Southern Borno(a district, with less exposure to insurgency) and Bama in Borno Central District. We are trying to curtail the insurgents in these two towns. I think there is no cause for alarm because the Special Force has regained most parts of the trouble spots in Borno.
“What the insurgents are doing now is to relocate to towns with difficult terrain but we are up to the task.”
A brief on Borno State’s website gave an insight into the new base of the insurgents on Mandara mountains.
The brief says: “The Mandara Mountain complex is situated at the southeastern part of the region. The rocks on the Mandara Mountain belong predominantly to the granite suite, the most widespread of which is a coarse granite composed of quartz and feldspar with little biotite.
“ The area records the highest altitude in the Bomo region, attaining heights of between 900-1200m above sea-level in the extreme south (Udo, 1970). The Gwoza and Kirawa hills are the most prominent hills that form part of the Mandara Mountains.”
The top source, confirmed that the CDS, Admiral Ibrahim Ola Sa’ad, had dispatched an eight-man team to Borno State to take stock of the situation, including the alleged threats.
The source added: “In the last four days, the eight-man team sent by the CDS had been in Borno State for on-the-spot review of the special operation. Members of the team started returning to Abuja on Sunday.
“Although the team will brief the CDS on Monday, preliminary reports confirmed that ‘there are skirmishes here and there but they are not as significant as we are being made to believe.”
Defence Headquarters spokesman Brig.-Gen. Chris Olukolade, said: “I know that our patrols are taking care of some of these threats.”
A source in Borno State Government said: “We are aware that there are issues in Bama, which has been a base of the insurgents. The challenge the security agencies are having is that the people of Bama are not as co-operative as much as expected.
“Many people in Bama are afraid that they could be killed by the insurgents if they cooperate with security agencies.”
On the letters written to public officers and workers not to report in their offices, the government official said: “The insurgents do no even need to write letters; they have always threatened workers. The letters are not new at all because the threats had been in place all along.”
