Blow to Boko Haram in Niger: Top Leader Eliminated

The terrorist group Boko Haram has suffered a major setback after Niger announced the elimination of one of its senior leaders.
On Thursday evening, the Nigerien army declared that it had killed a Boko Haram commander last week in the Lake Chad basin, a region straddling the borders of Niger, Nigeria, Chad, and Cameroon.
In its statement, the army said: “On August 15, 2025, the Nigerien Armed Forces, in the framework of a meticulously executed operation, succeeded in neutralizing the notorious ‘Bakoura,’ whose real name is Ibrahim Mahamadu, a feared leader of Boko Haram, on Chilawa Island in the Diffa region of southeastern Niger.”
Bakoura led a faction loyal to former Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau and refused to join the rival group, the “Islamic State in West Africa” (ISWAP). He and his followers relocated to the islands on the Nigerien side of Lake Chad.
Of Nigerian origin, Bakoura took over the leadership of Boko Haram following Shekau’s death during internal disputes in May 2021.
The Nigerien army further stated that a fighter jet from the air force had carried out “three precise and successive strikes on positions held by Bakoura on Chilawa Island in the Diffa region.”
Boko Haram, considered one of the most dangerous terrorist organizations in the region, launched its insurgency in Nigeria in 2009. The conflict has since claimed nearly 40,000 lives and displaced more than two million people, before spreading its terrorist activities to neighboring countries — Niger, Chad, and Cameroon.