The sect calls itself Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad, or “people committed to the propagation of the prophet's teachings and jihad,” widely known as Boko Haram.
In July 2009, Boko Haram members refused to follow a motorbike helmet law, leading to heavy-handed police tactics that set off an armed uprising in the northern state of Bauchi and spread into the states of Borno, Yobe, and Kano.
The incident was suppressed by the army and left more than eight hundred dead. It also led to the televised execution of Yusuf, as well as the deaths of his father-in-law and other sect members, which human rights advocates consider to be extrajudicial killings.
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