Boko Haram Leader Shekau missing in new Video

The new face of Boko Haram. Not identified yet, so we call him Shekau. BBC News Photo Nigeria’s Boko Haram now has a new face for their misguided struggle to establish an Islamic Republic over the country. In a new video, just like the last one released in June, the well known leader of the group, Abubakar Shekau was again conspicuously missing, further confirming speculations that he is either seriously wounded or dead.

The new eight-minute video, shows an unidentified young man, who speaks in the name of the Islamic State in West Africa calling on people to be patient: “We are still present everywhere we had been before.” The man speaks in the regional Hausa language, with subtitles in Arabic and English. The video shows the militants attacking a security checkpoint, seizing weapons, and slitting the throat of a man dressed in a police uniform.