INSURGENCY AND COUNTER INSURGENCY IN AFRICA: AN OVERVIEW

Abstract

This paper examines insurgency and counter insurgency in Africa .African States have been experiencing a
surge in violence instigated by insurgents .Several analysts have advanced the view that poverty,
longstanding economic disparities within States in Africa ,and structural violence ,are key factors
underlying the crisis. The complex nature of the situation in Africa has caused some observers to
characterized insurgency as violent extremism beyond a domestic agenda. The groups use of suicide
attacks particularly ,presents a dreadful trait typical of international terrorist violence, a style of
brutality hitherto alien to the African States. The study uses the descriptive research methodology. The
data for the study were sourced from secondary materials which includes both published and unpublished
works. In order to achieve the objective of the work, the paper highlighted the causes of insurgency and
also established the challenges of counter insurgency in the North east .The study nd out that the
challenges to government efforts in counter-insurgency in Africa are: insincerity in tackling root causes
of insurgency, proliferation of weapon ,inadequate enforcement of anti-terrorism law and limited
national institutional capacity. Based on it's ndings, the study recommends that: the government of
most African States should ensure and intensify it's effort toward addressing the problem of failure of
good governance ,issue of neglect, poverty, high rate of unemployment. The government should provide
adequate equipment and technological devices for security agencies ,so as to be able to effectively
tackle terrorism and insurgency in Africa.