Hussaini Ibrahim 
BORNO, Nigeria – In Mamuri, a farming village roughly 60 kilometres north of Maiduguri, the signs of recovery were subtle but unmistakable. Women arranged grains on weathered mats. Traders exchanged subdued negotiations. Children moved between market stalls, their laughter cautious, as though testing whether normal life had truly returned. After years of abandonment and fear, Mamuri’s market was functioning again — a quiet indicator of tentative stability. Across Borno State, communities battered by more than a decade of Boko Haram violence have begun reclaiming fragments of everyday life. Rural markets have reopened, farmers have returned to their fields, and displaced residents are cautiously speaking once more about peace.
Barely days after residents described their renewed sense of normalcy, suspected Boko Haram fighters launched a pre-dawn assault on nearby Magumeri town. Arriving on motorcycles, the assailants fired sporadically, torched homes, shops, and vehicles, and forced families to flee into the darkness — reopening wounds many believed had begun to heal. In this report, Hussaini Ibrahim, who narrowly escaped a Boko Haram attack while visiting the community — examines the uneasy divide between recovery and relapse, and the lived realities of communities striving to rebuild under the persistent threat of renewed violence.
A village before fear had a name
Mamuri, in Magumeri Local Government Area, was once known for its fertile farmlands, bustling Sunday market, and evening gatherings that spilled into the night. Families roasted maize by the roadside. Neighbours gossiped freely. Roads linking Mamuri to Gubio, Benisheikh, and Kukawa hummed with farmers returning home at dusk.
“Life was simple,” recalled Ibrahim Jidda, a livestock trader. “Every house had goats or sheep. Market days brought people from everywhere. We celebrated weddings, naming ceremonies — nobody was afraid.”
That ease vanished when Boko Haram — formally known as Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad — expanded across rural Borno. Between 2013 and 2015, the group overran several local government areas including Magumeri, Bama, Gwoza, Marte, and Kala-Balge. Villages emptied overnight. Schools closed. Markets collapsed.
“There was a time that if you travelled 20 kilometres away from Maiduguri, you were under the control of Boko Haram,” former governor Kashim Shettima once warned.
Mamuri lived that reality daily.
The night they came, everything changed
At the reopened market, Fatima Bukar sat behind a small pile of beans and millet. A widow, she once farmed alongside her husband and sold produce every Sunday.
Fatima: “It was peaceful. Every Sunday this place was full. Women cooked tuwo, men sold goats, children played. We stayed until night. Nobody feared anything.”
Her voice trembled as she described the first attack.
Fatima: “We heard gunshots, then shouting. They burned houses, shot people, and called us unbelievers. My husband told me to carry the children and run. I ran barefoot into the bush. We slept there until morning. When we returned, our house was ash.”
Coming back to the market now has been both healing and terrifying.
“Wallahi, I was shaking. I kept turning behind me. But the day someone bought something from me again, I felt a small peace — like maybe this life we lost can come back little by little,” Fatima said.
Nearby, Halima Goni, her fingers blackened from charcoal, nodded in silent agreement. Boko Haram took her husband during an attack years ago.
Halima: “They came in the morning. My husband went out to help an old man escape. They shot him in front of us.”
She spent years in an internally displaced persons’ camp before hunger forced her return.
Halima: “Coming back was not easy. But my children needed food. Now when I bring charcoal, it sells. This market is helping us breathe again.”
Markets as medicine
For many residents, the return of trading is not just economic — it is emotional survival.
“This market stopped me from leaving my village to beg somewhere else,” Ibrahim Jidda said. “The first day people came to buy, I felt strong again.”
Across Mamuri and neighbouring Jakana, residents told AHR that commerce had become a form of recovery — a declaration that life, however bruised, was still stubbornly present.
But recovery in Borno is never linear.
When the darkness returned
Just days after these interviews, suspected Boko Haram fighters attacked Magumeri town at around 1:15am on Sunday.
Spokesperson for the Borno State Police Command, ASP Nahum Daso, confirmed the incident. “Unknown gunmen suspected to be Boko Haram invaded Magumeri town, burning houses and vehicles. However, they did not kill anyone,” he said, adding that joint security operations restored calm.
The Chairman of Magumeri Local Government, Abubakar Abdulkadir Yaro, said the attackers fled after being confronted by security forces. “They sneaked into the town and set ablaze residential houses and property,” he said. “Our gallant troops, the Civilian JTF, hunters, and volunteers responded swiftly and repelled them.”
No lives were lost — a small mercy. But the destruction cut deep
Our correspondent, who witnessed the attack, described the terror. “Many of us were asleep. Gunshots woke us up. People ran in different directions. They burned homes, vehicles, shops — even ones that just reopened.”
Security sources later confirmed vehicles were destroyed near the market square, intensifying fears that insurgents may be regrouping around the Magumeri–Gubio–Kros Kawa axis.
“We had just started living again”
For those in Mamuri, news of the attack was like reopening an old wound.
A trader sent a brief voice note after hearing the news: “The day you left, we were happy. We laughed small. Now see what has happened again.”
Governor Babagana Zulum responded by declaring a state-wide day of fasting and prayer, urging residents of all faiths to participate — a gesture that underscored how deeply insecurity continues to shape public life in Borno.
Mamuri is not fully healed. Jakana remains tense. Magumeri has once again tasted fear.
Yet amid the ashes, residents speak with stubborn clarity about what they want.
“We are trying,” one woman said quietly. “We want life. We want our markets. We want peace.”
In Borno, laughter and tears now share the same space — and both are real.
About the Author
Otamere Gladness 
Oluwatobi Adu 