North East

The North East is Nigeria's largest zone by land area and its least densely populated. It stretches from the Mandara mountains on the Cameroon border across the savannah of Adamawa and Taraba to the sahel of Borno and Yobe, and its northern edge touches the shrinking waters of Lake Chad.

Its history is older than Nigeria by a thousand years. The Kanem-Borno empire, centred on the Kanuri, was one of the longest-lasting states in African history, trading across the Sahara and adopting Islam in the eleventh century. Around it live Babur-Bura, Marghi, Shuwa Arab, Bachama, Higgi, Jukun and Fulani communities, and Taraba alone counts scores of distinct languages.

Since 2009 the zone has carried the heaviest burden of the insurgency in the north east, with large displacement in Borno and Yobe. Reconstruction, resettlement and the recovery of farming and fishing around Lake Chad now shape much of public life there.