March 12, 2025: Africa is the scene of furious combat in Nigeria as well as in Eastern Congo that has left over 7,000 people dead. M23 rebels have captured the provincial capitals of Goma and Bukavu. This threatens the valuable mining operations there. This is a major source of income for the government. Rare earth and minerals are essential for industrialized countries. China has brought in its own security forces. This is forbidden by Congolese law but is allowed to happen in order to keep the mineral exports and foreign income going.

Further south Nigeria continues suffering multiple economic, political and security disasters. Inflation is at historically high levels. New president Bola Tinubu took office in May 2023 and promptly implemented some of his promised changes. This backfired as inflation rose rapidly causing many Nigerians to suffer from hunger and under-employment. Inflation has rendered the national currency, the naira, nearly worthless. In central Benue State students rioted and burned buildings to protest the deaths of three security guards.

Tinubu’s defenders claim that the president inherited all these problems but after a year his solutions have not worked and Nigerians and the economy are in crisis mode. Despite considerable oil resources, foreign companies have left. These firms long supplied the resources and management to keep the oil production going. The foreign firms cite a hostile atmosphere that makes continued operations in Nigeria impractical. The departing foreign companies cite government inability or unwillingness to deal with increasing theft and destruction or plundering of company property. The departing firms see the situation as hopeless and are abandoning once profitable operations. The Nigerian government does not appear able to solve these problems and foreign firms do not believe the new government will have any success in dealing with the crisis.

Meanwhile, Nigeria is still dealing with older problems that are also getting worse. For example, in 2021 the Islamic terrorists seemed to be declining while tribal violence was causing more problems. Islamic terrorists have become gangsters while pretending to still be Islamic terrorists. Then there is Boko Haram. There are still millions of refugees plus substantial economic damage in northeastern Borno State. This is where Boko Haram got started and continues to devastate the provincial welfare and security.

There seems to be no end in sight because of local corruption. Unexpectedly competent leadership in the security forces momentarily reduced the violence, but only for a short time. That violence has since increased. All this was caused by a local group of Taliban pretenders calling themselves Boko Haram. Their activity in the capital of Borno State grew for a decade until in 2014 it seemed unstoppable. It took over a year for the government to finally muster sufficient military strength to cripple but not destroy this threat. This did not get much media attention outside Africa, even though in 2014 Boko Haram killed more people than ISIL did in Syria and Iraq. The main reason for Boko Haram gains in 2014 and 2015 was corruption in the army, which severely crippled effective counterterrorism efforts. By itself Boko Haram was too small to have much impact on a national scale but the inability to deal with this problem put a spotlight on the corruption that has hobbled all progress in Nigeria for decades.

At the time, Muhammadu Buhari was a new president. Buhari was a former general and a Moslem elected in early 2015. He made some progress in changing the corrupt army culture, but that is still a work in progress even though he was reelected in early 2019. Buhari never completed his reforms and his successor Tinubu is equally unable to enact reforms that work.

The problems with too many tribal feuds, not enough oil money and too much corruption continue to create unrest throughout the country. This is especially bad down south in the oil producing region, the Niger River Delta. Violence against oil facilities continues. Worse, local politicians and business leaders had taken over the oil theft business. Northern Moslems want more control over the federal government and the oil money.

Northern and central Nigeria suffers from increasing violence as nomadic Moslem herders move south and clash with largely Christian farmers over land use and access to scarce water sources. During the last decade these tribal feuds have killed more people than Boko Haram. The situation is still capable of sliding into regional civil wars, over money and political power. Corruption and ethnic/tribal/religious rivalries threaten to trigger, at worse, another civil war and, at least, more street violence and public anger. President Tinubu has inherited a situation many believe he cannot handle. That is why foreign companies running the oil operations have fled and oil income is expected to decline still further while violence and corruption increase.