Africa: Is the “new” Boko Haram leader a Cameroonian?

In a recent article, Le Monde says, Bana Blaachera, the new head of Boko Haram was a Cameroonian. A fake information, since he is Nigerian.

In an article published on June 9, 2016 on the website of Le Monde Afrique, the reporter Seidik Abba says Bana Blaachera presented as the new leader of the terrorist group Boko Haram, is from Cameroon. L’Oeil du Sahel rejects this in its issue of June 13 that  he is not Cameroonian, but a Nigerian.

While waiting to learn more about the real place of Bana Blaachera in the command structure of the terrorist cult, “the newspaper is able to state that the new ‘strong man’ of Boko Haram, if its really the case, is not from Cameroon. In his forties, his real name is Bana Blatchiraé. From the Kanuri ethnic group, he is from the Blatchiraé village, from which he takes his second name, “writes the biweekly.

According to an informed source, “Blatchiraé, literally translated in Kanuri, means the village sand. Bla means village and Tchiraé, sand. This name was given to Bana to better distinguish it from other Bana “. It is a village located north-east of Nigeria, in the state of Borno.“Located less than ten kilometers from the Cameroonian border, it is located on the Banki-Kumshé road, still in Nigeria. It is also in Banki Blatchiraé that Bana made his Koranic studies. Now Banki (Nigeria) and Amchide (Cameroon) , are two twin localities,” reports our colleague.

Bana was very active on both sides of the border between Ndjamena and Banki, via Kousseri. “When hunting for followers of Boko Haram was launched in 2009 in Nigeria, Blatchiraé Bana, one of the followers of Mohammed Yusuf, the founder of the sect, chose to take refuge in the Far North Region of Cameroon, neighboring state of Borno. He took up residence, according to various sources, in Maroua, the great metropolis of the region. There, with other members of Boko Haram, he will weave the web logistics of the sect and thin arms traffic routes of Kousseri, Cameroonian city border with Ndjamena, to Borno State, “also states the newspaper.

K'mer Saga