The Lake Chad Basin: A Territory of Instability

The Lake Chad Basin (LCB) has been an area of instability for centuries. Clashes between various tribes and communities, indigenous people and outsiders, Muslims and animists, farmers and pastoralists have occurred in the region since pre-colonial times. In recent decades, the permanent military-political and socio-economic crises in the LCB have been superimposed by new adversities associated with global warming – longer droughts, more destructive floods, less predictable rainfall, etc. Climate disasters have caused the reconfiguration of the lake coast, the reduction of arable and pasture lands, their erosion, the disappearance of many species of plants, animals and fish, which, in turn, has exacer bated conflicts between various groups of the local population over access to natural resources. Since the mid-2010s, the LCB has been invaded by Islamists, who raised the violence to previously unseen levels, but at the same time began to develop an economy of war in the region and provide services to the local population, thus en couraging Muslim civilians to join the jihadist movement. Communal self-defense groups, which were initially formed to support the regular armies of the LCB countries in their war on Boko Haram but gradually evolved into criminal struc tures, are also beginning to pose a threat to security in the LCB. The most important problem facing LCB residents is that they are constantly caught between two fires: Islamists con sider them “agents of the government”, while the authorities accuse them of collaborating with militants. Since the mili tary cannot always protect the population, communities develop their own survival strategies, which benefits the Islamists and weakens state power in the region.