As the year 2016 draws to a close there are perceptible signs that the jihadist forces are on the run on all major fronts. In Iraq's Mosul, the very bastion of the Islamic State is under attack by the government forces and a part of the city has already fallen to them. In Syria, the government forces have driven out the IS and other rebel groups from the strategic city of Aleppo, a development which tilts the balance of power struggle in favour of President Bashar al-Assad. And in Nigeria, the brutal gang called the Boko Haram has been thrown out of its main camp in Sambisa forest and its foot soldiers are on the run. "Technically, we have won the war against Boko Haram," an elated President Muhammad Buhari announced on the eve of Christmas. Though such an announcement of wiping out the Boko Haram was claimed in 2015 also, but this time the claim is said to be based on some concrete evidence. The Boko Haram had acquired the myth of being invincible. Launched in 1999 to establish what it called an Islamic state the Boko Haram has killed some 15,000 civilians and displaced nearly 1.7 million Nigerians. At the height of its power it controlled as big an area as Belgium with its headquarters in the heart of game reserve Sambisa forest - which had earned it notoriety of a 'new home' of the two hundred or so Chibok schoolgirls who were kidnapped in 2014. Defeating the Boko Haram was in fact a huge challenge for the Nigerian government, especially as it lacked the international support like the one the governments in Damascus and Baghdad have received over a period of time. And this was all the more difficult given the impression, aired by the pro-military lobbies in Lagos, that even some NGOs, including Amnesty International "fabricated reports on which countries based their decision not to sell equipment to Nigeria." They also accuse the social media and cyber wings of confusing the world public opinion about the government's capacity to defeat the Boko Haram.

Does the expulsion of the Boko Haram from its principal hideout in Nigeria mean eradication of the curse from the entire region? Probably not, because its fighters are believed to be fleeing to neighbouring countries. Not only do they still occupy large swaths of countryside around Lake Chad, they are also regrouping in Cameroon, Chad and Niger, posing a challenge to the regional Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF). On their own, the neighbours have not much of capacity to deal with terrorists. Even in Nigeria itself, its remnants - which may never run out of supply given the emerging threat of growing Sunni-Shia schism - are expected to keep rocking the boat. Imagine the devotional influence the Boko Haram has gained in the Nigerian society - on December 11 two girls of ages seven and eight walked into a market in Maiduguri and blew them up. Then to draw support from the educated sections of Nigerian society, the terrorist outfit now poses itself as an insurgent movement under the rubric of "Islamic State of West Africa". Having lost at the battlefields, the terrorist groups are invariably prone to join the governments in battles for minds and hearts. And their foot soldiers are going to be the individual suicide-bombers instead of gangs and bands. So be it Iraq, Syria, Nigeria or any other country, the war on terrorism is not going to over anytime soon; it is only going to be fought with a set of new tactics.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2016