Boko Haram Crisis: Among The Vigilantes Of North-East Nigeria

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by BBC

"Nigeria is my country. I will fight for my country. I would lose my life for my country," says Umar Dawaki, as his eyes fill with tears.

For years he has worked as a cemetery inspector in the north-eastern Nigerian city of Yola and also hunted wild animals, but now he has volunteered to join the battle against militant group Boko Haram.

It has waged a five-year insurgency to create an Islamic state, establishing bases along Nigeria's border with Cameroon and Chad.

Mr Dawaki tells me just last week he fought alongside the Nigerian military close to the town of Mubi.

"I killed more than 10 of them and we could see some were Chadian. We could tell by the tribal marks on their faces," he says.

He says his own weapons include a small knife that he used to slit the throat of one jihadist and a bow and arrow, as well as buffalo horns dipped in cobra poison.

"A knife cannot penetrate us. If bombs drop they cannot kill us," Mr Dawaki says, pointing to a leather amulet on his arm and another around his neck containing verses from the Koran.

"When we are on the battlefront we are focused on the job - we are patriotic, we want to save people from Boko Haram attacks and avenge what they are doing to our people," Tijjani Mohammed, a retired civil servant who just returned from fighting told me.

"We lost three of our men and seven were injured," he says, adding that despite the losses, the mission against the insurgents had been a success.

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