Wulowulo: New Terror Group Threatens Nigeria’s North-Central

Wulowuo, a new Boko Haram splinter group, has surfaced in Nasarawa State, raising heightened concerns in Nigeria’s North-Central zone that has seen a worrying rise in extremist infiltration.

Governor Abdullahi Sule first raised the alarm during a security stakeholders’ meeting in Lafia, warning that Wulowulo’s arrival could deepen the already fragile security situation in the region. The military, in response, has integrated counter-Wulowulo directives into its ongoing operations across multiple theatres.

Wulowulo’s Emergence in Nasarawa State

Governor Sule announced on October 14, 2025, that Wulowulo had begun infiltrating Nasarawa and adjoining states. He described the sect as an “offshoot of Boko Haram seeking a foothold in the North-Central,” and urged immediate countermeasures.

He compared the development to the Lakurawa group, another jihadist faction that spread from Sokoto and Kebbi into Kwara State, signalling a troubling expansion of violent extremism into previously unaffected areas.

While the Nasarawa Police Command initially denied verified evidence of Wulowulo’s presence, federal intelligence agencies and the military took the warnings seriously, updating their national threat map and deploying surveillance assets to the region.

What’s The Government Saying?

Nigeria’s Defence Headquarters (DHQ) vowed to crush a newly identified terrorist faction, declaring that all armed actors threatening national security will be treated as terrorists, regardless of their chosen names.

Offshoots such as Ansaru, Lakurawa, and now Wulowulo represent a pattern of fragmentation where smaller factions branch out to claim territory, recruits, and funding across new regions. Wulowulo’s rise reflects a fractured jihadist ecosystem where rival extremist movements now operate semi-independently across Nigeria’s north and middle belt.

At a Defence Headquarters briefing on October 17, Major General Markus Kangye, Director of Defence Media Operations, issued a blunt warning: “Call yourself whatever name you like, you are a terrorist, a bandit, and we will go after you.”

He stressed that while some crimes begin under police jurisdiction, the military intervenes once threats escalate beyond civil control. Wulowulo, he noted, fits the definition of a terrorist entity and will be treated accordingly.

According to the DHQ, new directives mandate that all active operations integrate counter-Wulowulo intelligence, ensuring early suppression before the group gains operational depth.

Implications of Wulowulo’s Emergence

The emergence of the Wulowulo terror group signals a worrying evolution in Nigeria’s security crisis, highlighting how jihadist activity is expanding beyond its traditional theatres in the North-East. Once confined largely to Borno, Yobe, and Adamawa States, extremist violence has now seeped into the North-Central, further complicating the local security architecture.

Wulowulo’s operations also reflect a growing convergence between terrorism and banditry. In many cases, such groups collaborate with criminal networks to secure logistics, weapons, and safe passage, merging religious extremism with economic opportunism. This fusion of motives makes it increasingly difficult for security agencies to distinguish between ideological insurgents and profit-driven bandits, underscoring the need for a more coordinated intelligence framework that integrates both military and police operations.

Nigeria’s security architecture, already stretched thin by multiple internal crises, faces fresh pressure from these emerging micro-factions. The challenge is not just their lethality but their adaptability and ability to exploit weak governance and terrain. Analysts warn that containing them will require decentralized command structures and stronger community-level intelligence networks capable of early detection and rapid response.

Compounding the threat is the porous nature of Nigeria’s borders with Cameroon, Niger, and Benin. The movement of groups like Wulowulo raises the spectre of cross-border insurgency, particularly into areas such as Cameroon’s Far North and Benin’s Pendjari region, zones where affiliates of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) and Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) are already active. Without coordinated regional surveillance and intelligence-sharing, these borders risk becoming conduits for the spread of violent extremism.

Wulowulo’s rise mirrors the broader southern drift of Sahelian jihadism. Across Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, Islamist insurgents affiliated with the Islamic State and al-Qaeda continue pushing southward toward coastal West Africa, exploiting political instability and weak state control, and it could mark the early phase of a new Sahel-linked jihadist expansion into Nigeria’s heartland. The development reinforces urgent calls for enhanced intelligence cooperation, improved cross-border security, and renewed political will to address the local grievances that extremists continue to exploit.