Fresh controversy has emerged over the reported killing of senior Islamic State West Africa Province commander Abu Bilal Minuki, also known as Abubakar Mainok, after Nigerian authorities announced his death for a second time despite earlier claims that he had already been eliminated in 2024.
The renewed announcement followed a joint counterterrorism operation reportedly carried out by Nigerian and United States forces in the Lake Chad Basin, an operation publicly confirmed by Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Donald Trump.
The contradiction has now sparked serious questions over battlefield intelligence records, identity verification and the accuracy of previous military announcements involving one of the region’s most wanted extremist commanders.
Earlier military announcement in 2024
Checks revealed that in April 2024, the Defence Headquarters had already listed Abu Bilal Minuki among terrorist commanders allegedly killed during military operations conducted between January and March 2024.
At the time, then Director of Defence Media Operations, Edward Buba, identified Minuki as the “Head of IS-Al Furqan Province” linked to both ISGS and ISWAP operations.
According to the military briefing, Minuki — also known as Abubakar Mainok — operated around the Birnin Gwari forest corridor in Kaduna State and along the Abuja–Kaduna highway, areas notorious for insurgent and kidnapping activities.
The military had stated that he was killed on February 21, 2024, during clearance operations targeting terrorist hideouts.
The Defence Headquarters also claimed that the wider operation led to the killing of several other senior insurgent figures and dozens of fighters during coordinated offensives across different theatres of operation.
Fresh announcement in 2026
However, in May 2026, both Presidents Tinubu and Trump announced another operation that allegedly killed the same commander again.
President Tinubu described the strike as a major success in Nigeria–United States security cooperation, stating that Nigerian troops worked alongside American forces in a “daring joint operation” against a terrorist enclave in the Lake Chad region.
According to Tinubu, early intelligence assessments confirmed the killing of Abu-Bilal Al-Manuki, also known as Abu-Mainok, together with several of his lieutenants.
The Nigerian president praised the operation as a milestone in the fight against terrorism and commended the professionalism of both Nigerian and American personnel involved in the mission.
On his part, President Trump announced the operation on his Truth Social platform, describing Minuki as “the most active terrorist in the world” and claiming he served as the second-in-command of ISIS globally.
Trump stated that American intelligence agencies had tracked the commander across Africa before the final operation was executed.
He further claimed that the killing would significantly weaken ISIS global operations and reduce the terror group’s operational capacity.
Questions over intelligence and identity
The conflicting announcements have now raised uncertainty over whether:
- the same individual was mistakenly declared dead in 2024
- another militant was wrongly identified as Minuki during earlier operations
- the commander survived the previous military assault
- or intelligence agencies only recently confirmed his true identity
Security analysts say such contradictions are not entirely uncommon in counterterrorism operations, especially in remote conflict zones where insurgent commanders frequently use aliases, false identities and misinformation to evade capture.
The development has nevertheless intensified scrutiny over official military communication and the reliability of public battlefield assessments during Nigeria’s long-running war against insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin and wider North-East region.