Nigeria: Jihadists kill army general and soldiers in attack on Borno state base

Jihadists killed an army general and several troops in an attack on a military base in northeast Nigeria, local government and intelligence sources told AFP Thursday.

Brigadier General Oseni Omoh Braimah was the second top officer to be killed in five months as violence surges across the country's mostly Muslim north.

Four sources, including the military confirmed the overnight attack on the base at Benisheikh, about 75 kilometres from Borno state capital Maiduguri. One intelligence source put the death toll at 18.

Unidentified jihadists overran the base and torched vehicles in Benisheikh, the source told AFP.

President Bola Tinubu paid tribute to the dead soldiers in a statement that named Braimah.

Tinubu "praised the courage and heroism of the soldiers who fought valiantly to repel the terrorists and ensure that Boko Haram could not overrun the communities the soldiers protect."

Braimmah's death follows the killing of Brigadier General Musa Uba by ISWAP in November. He was the highest-ranking military official to die in the conflict since 2021.

Nigeria's military said that "insurgents attempted to breach the defensive perimeter of the military installation" but were "decisively engaged and forced to retreat in disarray."

The statement from Major General Michael Onoja, a defence headquarters spokesman, said that the attack "resulted in the loss of a few brave and gallant soldiers," without disclosing a toll or saying who had been killed.

Rising jihadist violence

Africa's most populous country has been fighting a jihadist insurgency for 17 years, since Boko Haram's 2009 uprising, which has seen the emergence of powerful splinter groups including Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).

Researchers have note a rise in violence since last year.

Maiduguri has seen two suicide bombings since December — the type of bloody, urban attacks reminiscent of the insurgency's peak a decade ago.

On Wednesday, the US State Department said in a notice it was authorising "non-emergency US government employees" to leave Abuja "due to the deteriorating security situation."

While the insurgency is concentrated in the northeastern countryside, jihadists from Nigeria and the neighbouring Sahel have made inroads in western Nigeria, where organised crime gangs known as "bandits" have been raiding villages and extorting farmers and artisanal miners for years.

The attacks, which left 90 dead this week alone, included an assault in Kebbi state that police blamed on a local jihadist group known as Mahmuda, which is affiliated with Al-Qaeda.

Other assaults included those blamed on bandits, which the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) said launched raids "from one village to the next" over three days, without military intervention.

Father Illah Vincent Iko, CAN coordinator for Shanga area in Kebbi, said at least 1,900 people had been displaced by the attacks.

Kebbi sits on Nigeria's border with Benin and Niger and since 2025 has been targeted by a rising number of jihadist attacks.

Conflict monitor ACLED says there has been a surge in attacks carried out by militants affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

In nearby Kwara state, in October, fighters from the Al-Qaeda-affiliated JNIM claimed an attack after years of researchers warning that the jihadist conflict ravaging the Sahel risked spreading south towards coastal west African states.

In December, the United States, with Nigerian assistance, bombed northwest Sokoto state, targeting Islamic State Sahel Province (ISSP) fighters usually found in neighbouring Niger, along with Mali and Burkina Faso.

Earlier this year, the United States sent 200 troops to Nigeria to provide technical and training support to the country's soldiers fighting jihadist groups.