Nigeria is bearing a significant share of the financial, troop and logistical burden of the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) as persistent funding and capability gaps threaten efforts to contain the Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) insurgency across the Lake Chad Basin.

The funding challenge has put the sustainability of the regional force under scrutiny, with Defence Minister Christopher Musa calling for greater African ownership of the financing and sustenance of regional security mechanisms amid continued reliance on support from international partners

Musa raised the issue last week during a high-level discussion organised by the Ministry of Defence on the margins of the 81st United Nations General Assembly High-Level Week in New York.

The defence minister said that while regional mechanisms such as the MNJTF had received support from international partners, including the European Union, African member states needed to increasingly finance and sustain their own security frameworks.

He argued that countries benefiting directly from regional security arrangements must increasingly take responsibility for sustaining them.

The MNJTF, comprising Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin, was established as a regional response to the Boko Haram insurgency and later expanded its focus as ISWAP emerged as a major threat in the region.

The concern comes as the MNJTF and its partners continue to identify gaps in equipment, logistics and operational support.

At its 18th Joint Steering Committee meeting in N’Djamena, Chad, on September 7 and 8, the force reviewed its requirements and support mechanisms, with communications systems, counter-drone technology, electronic warfare and counter-IED capabilities listed among its operational needs

The Guardian gathered that Nigeria has continued to shoulder a significant portion of the financial, troop and logistical burden of the regional force, with the imbalance raising concerns about the sustainability of the arrangement.

Records from the Lake Chad Basin Commission showed that Nigeria directly disbursed about $209.08 million to the MNJTF between 2015 and 2021.

But the current consolidated financial contribution of each of the troop-contributing countries, however, remains unclear.

A senior defence official, told The Guardian on Sunday that the situation had persisted partly because Nigeria contributes a significant proportion of the troops and equipment deployed under the MNJTF.

The official said the funding gap could remain a challenge if other countries in the Lake Chad Basin do not increase their financial and operational contributions to the joint campaign.

According to the source, while Nigeria has the strongest interest in sustaining operations because it bears the brunt of the insurgency, a more sustainable arrangement would require greater commitment from all the participating countries.

Indeed, Nigeria’s contribution has also come alongside substantial international assistance to the regional force.

The European Union, the largest external contributor to the MNJTF, said its support had reached €234.4 million to date, covering areas including operational and logistical support, mobility, medical services, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, infrastructure and equipment.

The United Kingdom has also mobilised £5 million through the African Union Commission, while the African Union in May 2026 provided $1 million from its Peace Fund Crisis Reserve Facility.

Support from France and the United States has largely been provided in kind to individual MNJTF troop-contributing countries, according to EU documentation, rather than as a single direct financial contribution to the joint force

The scale of the external support highlights the context of Musa’s call for greater regional ownership, even as the African Union has raised concerns over significant funding and capability gaps affecting the MNJTF.

At its 1,347th Peace and Security Council meeting held on May 18, 2026, the AU acknowledged Nigeria’s unwavering leadership and commitment in providing critical logistical support to the fight against Boko Haram and other armed groups in the Lake Chad Basin.

Indeed, for Nigeria, the challenge is particularly significant because the country is not only providing critical logistical support to the MNJTF but is also at the centre of the insurgency it was created to contain.

Borno remains the epicentre of the crisis, while the activities of Boko Haram and ISWAP continue to generate displacement, disrupt livelihoods and place pressure on military and humanitarian resources across the region.

At the time of the MNJTF’s reactivation in 2015, announced national contingents included 3,750 troops from Nigeria, 3,000 from Chad, 2,650 from Cameroon, 1,000 from Niger and 750 from Benin, bringing the combined strength to about 11,150 personnel.

However, the composition and strength of the force have changed over the years following Niger’s suspension of participation which has also made security burden facing the regional force  substantial as violence and displacement continuing to rise across the Lake Chad Basin.

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), recorded security incidents across the region increased by 80 per cent between January 2024 and April 2026.

Between September 2025 and May 2026 alone, nearly 1,800 security incidents and more than 5,700 fatalities were recorded across the Basin.

The incidents included attacks on civilians, killings, kidnappings, explosions, clashes between armed groups and raids on villages.

The worsening violence has also triggered fresh displacement. UNHCR said more than 3.5 million people are forcibly displaced across the wider Lake Chad Basin, while 8.2 million people require humanitarian assistance.

Since January 2026, more than 77,500 people have been displaced across Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger, including more than 16,000 people who fled attacks in northeastern Nigeria into Niger’s Diffa region.

Borno State remains the epicentre of the crisis, according to UNHCR, while the effects of the conflict continue to spill across borders.

In Chad’s Lac Province, recurrent attacks and military operations have displaced about 60,000 people, while persistent attacks and abductions continue to affect communities in Cameroon’s Far North.

The displacement burden is heavy in Nigeria. The International Organization for Migration’s April 2026 displacement dashboard put the number of internally displaced persons across the four affected countries at more than 3.3 million, with Nigeria accounting for 2,333,190, or 72 per cent, followed by Cameroon with 510,855, Chad with 242,927 and Niger with 167,597.

The humanitarian consequences are also extending beyond displacement. UNHCR said one in five households in affected areas reported no longer feeling safe in their communities, while about half of children in the hardest-hit areas are out of school. In Chad’s Lac Province, the proportion exceeds 78 per cent.

UNHCR and its partners have appealed for $29 million through December 2026 to sustain protection and humanitarian operations in the affected areas.

Speaking with The Guardian, Former Director-General of the Land Forces Simulation Centre, Major General Dayo Olukoju (rtd.), said Nigeria’s substantial contribution to the regional force reflected its strategic position in the crisis.

Olukoju said Nigeria must, however, continue to restrategise following Niger’s withdrawal to ensure that the development did not create operational gaps that could be exploited by terrorists.

He said no country should be allowed to hold Nigeria to ransom over the regional security arrangement, stressing that Nigeria, as the largest country and a major troop contributor, must continue to protect its national security interests.

Olukoju also expressed confidence in the ability of Musa, a former commander of the MNJTF and former Chief of Defence Staff, to address the challenges confronting the force.

But security and intelligence expert and Managing Director of Beacon Consulting Limited, Kabiru Adamu, offered a different perspective, cautioning against attributing the funding difficulties solely to a lack of commitment by other countries.

Adamu wondered why the minister of defence had to raise such an issue in far away New York while arguing that the affected countries needed to develop stronger regional solutions to the problem.

Adamu said the countries participating in the MNJTF also had their own economic and security challenges, adding that a sustainable funding arrangement required a coordinated regional approach.

He said the countries should convene an inter-ministerial meeting involving defence, finance and economic planning authorities to determine how resources could be mobilised to sustain the MNJTF.

According to him, Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger, Chad and Benin remain important components of the regional security arrangement and should collectively develop a mechanism for financing the force.

He, however, said the security crisis could not be solved through military funding alone.

Adamu said governments in the region must address underlying factors such as poverty, unemployment and lack of access to education, while political leaders must take a more comprehensive approach to the crisis.

On his part, Administration and security sector governance expert at the University of Abuja, Prof. Philip Dahida, said the challenge went beyond funding, stressing the need for stronger political commitment by governments in the region.

Dahida said the MNJTF remained relevant because of its role in intelligence sharing and coordination among countries facing cross-border movements of terrorists, weapons and other criminal networks.

He argued, however, that military operations alone could not eliminate the underlying causes of insecurity across the Lake Chad Basin.

According to him, governments must tackle the social and economic conditions that continue to create an environment for insecurity to thrive.

He called for greater transparency in the management of foreign security assistance, saying international funding could sometimes come with conditions that governments needed to disclose and properly account for.

Dahida further raised concerns about the management of external assistance once received, arguing that resources provided to support security operations must be properly managed to achieve their intended objectives.