Back in year 2017, when fighters from a shadow group, known as Ahlu Sunnah Wa-Jama (ASWJ) or followers of the prophetic tradition, began launching attacks in northern Mozambique in October 2017, security agencies dismissed it as isolated acts of banditry.
But the fighters continued attacking villages and towns in the resource-rich Cabo Delgado region, killing residents, burning houses and forcing thousands from their homes.
While not much is known about the fighters or ASWJ itself, some of the more recent assaults have been claimed by the ISIL-affiliated Islamic State Central Africa Province (ISCAP).
In April this year, police said 52 villagers in Cabo Delgado were killed when they refused to be recruited by the fighters, a major escalation that prompted authorities to admit for the first time the presence of ISIL-affiliated fighters in the country.
The National Council for Defence and Security, the body that advises President Filipe Nyusi on security matters, said in a statement it had analysed the situation of the attacks in the province of Cabo Delgado and concluded that … they were committed by the Islamic State, a terrorist organisation. The council added that the country was dealing with external aggression.
The group, known locally as al-Shabab, with no established links to the armed group in Somalia, has continued to launch attacks, briefly seizing key towns, barricading important roads and reportedly beheading residents and abducting girls.
Some displaced villagers have shared gory details and say they are too worried to even contemplate returning home soon. For several months, we couldn’t sleep well because these al-Shabab boys could strike anytime. They came mostly at night, said Miguel Marcos, 57, who fled to the district headquarters in Pemba.
We were left on our own. No government security came to our rescue, no help from anywhere. We lived in great fear until I decided to run away with my family,” Marcos reported.
Monitoring groups say at least 1,500 people have been killed and tens of thousands displaced since the fighting began.
The increasing attacks by ASWJ in Cabo Delgado speaks both of the failure by the Mozambican government to counter the threat posed by the insurgency, in addition to the insurgents continuing to enhance their overall operational capabilities within Cabo Delgado province,” Ryan Cummings, a political and security risk analyst, reported as Africa-News reports.