Massacre in Nigeria Spurs Outcry Over Military Tactics

Burned houses and ashes were left in the wake of heavy fighting between security forces and Islamist militants in Baga.

Days later, the survivors’ faces tensed at the memory of the grim evening: soldiers dousing thatched-roof homes with gasoline, setting them on fire and shooting residents when they tried to flee. As the village rose up in smoke, one said, a soldier threw a child back into the flames. 

Even by the scorched-earth standards of the Nigerian military’s campaign against Islamist insurgents stalking the nation’s north, what happened on the muddy shores of Lake Chad this month appears exceptional. 

The village, Baga, found itself in the cross hairs of Nigerian soldiers enraged by the killing of one of their own, said survivors who fled here to the state capital, 100 miles south. Their home had paid a heavy price: as many as 200 civilians, maybe more, were killed during the military’s rampage, according to refugees, senior relief workers, civilian officials and human rights organizations. 

The apparent size of the civilian death toll — staunchly denied by Nigerian military officials, some of whom blame the insurgent group, Boko Haram, for the carnage — has prompted an unusual uproar. Though heavy civilian casualties are routine in the military’s confrontation with Boko Haram, with dozens dying in poor neighborhoods since 2010 as the army searches for “suspects,” Nigeria’s politicians usually have little to say about it. Past massacres of civilians in retaliation for soldier deaths have passed largely with impunity. 

This time, there have been calls in Nigeria’s national assembly for an investigation and the government has come under withering criticism at home and abroad. The military has said it has begun its own inquiry, and some longstanding observers of the country’s heavy-handed fight against Islamist militants say a tipping point may have been reached. 

“This is coming at a time when we have had similar situations” elsewhere, said Kole Shettima, chairman of the Center for Democracy and Development in the capital, Abuja. “People are tired of the excuses the military is giving and that’s why they are demanding an investigation. This time it’s different. There is a crisis of legitimacy in the military.” 

But in a country where corruption abounds and accountability is rare, others wondered whether it would truly become a watershed moment — or get brushed aside as an unfortunate side effect of fighting a dangerous insurgency. 

“This Baga is just on a bigger scale, but they have been doing this for ages,” the governor of the state, Kashim Shettima, one of the first officials to reach Baga afterward, said of the military. “They’ve not adhered to the rules of engagement,” said Mr. Shettima, who is not related to the democracy advocate. “When you burn down shops and massacre civilians, you are pushing them to join the camp of Boko Haram.” 

Yet, he continued, “We are in a Catch-22 situation.” Boko Haram is a deadly insurgent force that needs to be confronted, the governor said, but not by a military that terrorizes its own people. “We need them to carry out their duties in a civilized manner.” 

Some Baga residents who did not perish in the flames drowned while attempting to escape into Lake Chad, refugees here in the state capital said. Others were attacked by hippopotamuses in the shallow waters, officials said. Soldiers shot people as they ran from the burning houses, refugees said. 

“Many dead, many dead,” said Mohammed Muhammed, 40, a taxi driver from Baga. “People running into the flames, I saw that. If they didn’t run into the flames, the army will shoot them.” As flames enveloped the houses — “they used petroleum,” he said of the soldiers — he fled into the surrounding desert scrub. 

“If you come out” from the flaming houses “they will shoot you,” he said. “Please sir, charge them in the international court!” he shouted. 

Isa Kukulala, 26, a lanky bus driver who had left Baga that morning, gave a similar account: “They poured petrol on the properties. At the same time, they are shooting sporadically, inside the fire. They took a small child from his mother and threw him inside the fire. This is what I have witnessed.”