Even the
dead weren't safe from Boko Haram when the Islamist insurgency erupted in the
northeast Nigerian city of Maiduguri nearly seven years ago.
"They
began to destroy this one," said Babagana Modu, gesturing to a mound of
baked earth and sand -- the grave of a prominent Muslim cleric.
"We
tried to stop them but we couldn't. They had guns and we didn't. We only had
our shovels," the 30-year-old told AFP.
The dead
may no longer be able to tell tales but the grave-diggers of the Gwange
cemetery certainly can.
They talk
of a place where piles of bodies were routinely dumped from trucks and some
were even brought to be killed.
But in
recent times, Modu and his colleagues say their workload has decreased as
attacks become more sporadic and a sustained counter-insurgency brings a
relative calm to the much-targeted city.
"At
the height of the insurgency, 200, 300, 400 bodies were being brought here.
Sometimes the sanitation department trucks were bringing three truckloads of
dead bodies," said Modu.
"If
they still had more left, they would go back and bring them the next day. This
road just outside the cemetery was not passable because of the stench."
Modu's
estimation may be an exaggeration but not by much. At least 17,000, possibly
more, have died overall across the Muslim-majority north.
The
police and military launched a crackdown in Maiduguri after a series of Boko
Haram attacks at the end of July 2009. Some 800 Islamists, including the
group's then leader Muhammad Yusuf, were killed in just a few days in what is
considered the start of Boko Haram's insurgency.
Modu's
boss, Bulama Ali, speaks of smaller numbers, although he admitted there was a
time when the cemetery was almost full.
"In
the past we would get up to 20 to 30 bodies every day. Now we get five to 10.
Most of these are deaths from natural causes."
"It's
an indication that there's relative peace returned to Maiduguri and the
metropolis," he added.
Sixty-year-old
Ali's 22 staff are volunteers, young men dressed in fading replica football
shirts, dusty trousers and flip flops.
Some
started work with their fathers at a young age and know little else.
They now
dig graves in the parched earth, cut down trees for the wood to cover the
bodies or make earthenware pots that serve as grave markers for families of the
deceased.
Three-metre-long
(10 feet) mounds of earth for adults and smaller ones for children rise out of
the ground, uniformly facing east towards the Muslim holy city of Mecca.
Groups
and individuals quietly pay their respects to the dead off the sweeping paths
lined by neem trees, with the sounds only of bleating goats, birdsong and the
rustle of lizards darting through fallen leaves.
Not all
graves are marked. Those that are and with dates from 2009 onwards only hint at
the possibility of a connection to the insurgency.
"It's
not our business to ask how they died," said Ali.
The young
grave-diggers, though, are well aware of who lies just under the earth towards
the high perimeter wall.
"From
here to the wall over there and from there to the other end of the cemetery...
is all Boko Haram dead bodies," said Modu, pointing to a stretch of open
ground and scrub the size of a football pitch.
Islamic
custom dictates the dead are washed and wrapped in a shroud before being placed
on their right side and the body covered with wood and earth.
Boko
Haram's dead were not extended the courtesy. Instead, they were simply dumped
and covered, leaving only small ridges in the ground to indicate what lies
beneath.
Civilian
suspects who died in custody, including at Maiduguri's notorious Giwa Barracks
that has seen human rights groups accuse the military of flagrant abuse, also
have their final resting place in Gwange.
The
grave-diggers themselves recall being rounded up in the days when any young man
was a Boko Haram suspect, particularly in Gwange, once a hotbed for militant
sympathisers.
Now, as
Maiduguri tries to overcome its turbulent recent past, the young men who have
witnessed more than most the ultimate effects of the insurgency want some
recognition.
"We
work from morning to 6:00 pm before we shut the gates," said 25-year-old
Ibrahim Abubakar.
"We
work here and nobody cares to come around and even give us anything to buy
food. This really hurts us.
"This
is the largest cemetery in the city. The (state) government ought to give us
some attention."
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