The Sambisa forest is located at the northeastern tip of the West Sudanian Savanna and the southern boundary of the Sahel Acacia Savanna about 60 km. south east of Maiduguri the capital of the state.
It occupies about 60,000 square kilometers in the states of Borno, Yobe, Gombe, Bauchi along the corridor Darazo, Jigawa, and some parts of Kano state farther north.
It is administered by the local government of Askira/Uba in the south, by Damboa in the southwest, and by Konduga and Jere in the west.
The name of the forest comes from the village of Sambisa which is on the border with Gwoza in the East. The Gwoza hills in the East have peaks of 1,300 meters above sea level and form part of the Mandara Mountains range along the Cameroon-Nigeria border. The forest is drained by seasonal streams into the Yedseram and the Ngadda Rivers.
The Sambisa forest is one of the few forests in North Eastern Nigeria where sparse vegetation is the norm. Most of the vegetation is typical of the Sudanian Savanna although, because of human activity, some parts have become more like the Sahel savanna. The forest consists of a mixture of open woodland and sections of very dense vegetation of short trees about two metres high and thorny bushes, with a height of 1/2-1 metre, which is difficult to penetrate.
Major trees and bushes in the forest include tallow, rubber, wild black plum, birch, date palm, mesquite, acacia, monkey bread, redbushwillow, baobab, jackalberry, tamarind and terminalia.
According to report, 62 species of birds have been recorded in the Sambisa Game Reserve, including the guinea fowl, francolin, village weaver, Abyssinian ground hornbill, Arabian bustard, Savile’s bustard, African collared-dove, chestnut-bellied starling, black scrub-robin and the Sudan golden sparrow. The forest was also thought to be the last remaining site of the ostrich in Nigeria.
17 species of mammals were reported in 2010 in the Sambisa Game Reserve including, baboon, patas monkey, tantalus monkey, Grimm’s duiker, red-fronted gazelle, African bush elephant, roan antelope, hartebeest, African leopard and spotted hyenas.
It was Muhammed Buba Marwa, who as military administrator of Borno, commissioned Sambisa Forest. While commissioning the Sambisa Game Reserve, Marwa said, “Wildlife conversation in Borno state goes as far back as 1970 with the primary objectives of identifying and harnessing the numerous untapped wild flora and fauna and their natural environment to contribute to the overall socio-economic development of the state.”
Marwa also revealed that the Sambisa Game Reserve was established to promote tourism, conservation, scientific research, among others.
He added that the aims were to conserve and to also perpetuate the species’ diversity and genetic potentials of nature’s flora and fauna.
He said, “It is in realisation of this fact and in line with the present Federal Government Policy on environment and renewable resources that Borno State has decided to embark upon the development of the Game Reserve to meet the standard as a tourism centre.”
Sambisa Game Reserve has often been referred to as one of the best endowed habitat in the Northern Guinea/Sudan Savannah. There were 15 different large and small animal species, notably among which are; Roan Antelope, Topi, Gazelle, Warthog, Duikers, Baboons and Monkeys. It served as a dry season home-range for over 509 Elephants that are permanently situated in the southern part of Borno State.
The Reserve was also very rich in bird life, harbouring both resident and migratory species, popular among which are; Ostriches, Pelicans, Bustards, Secretary Birds and Hornbills.
The unique combination of Guinea and Sudan vegetation made it a tourism attraction.
However poaching, chopping downing trees for fuel, human agricultural penetration and most recent the Boko Haram jihadist group’s activities since 2013 have reduced their numbers since then.
During the colonial period, the Sambisa game reserve covered an area of 2,258 km2 (872 sq m) in the eastern part of the forest. Later reports put the size of the game reserve at 518 square kilometers or 686 square kilometers although some official documents included the Marguba Forest Reserve in the Sambisa Game Reserve.
From 1970, the reserve was used for safaris. It had a large population of leopards, lions, elephants, hyenas, that tourists could observe from cabins or safari lodges.
In 1991, the government of the state of Borno incorporated this reserve into the national park of the Chad Basin.
The terrorists took control of Sambisa on February 5, 2013 when they attacked the base station and killed two rangers, forcing other staff to flee. Since then no staff or anyone without link to the terrorists has been allowed into the reserve. Prior to their capture of the reserve, the insurgents’ stronghold was Bulabulin Ganaram within Maiduguri, but the soldiers and volunteer youth group popularly called Civilian JTF uprooted them early last year and they initially dispersed and later congregated on Sambisa, which they have made “impregnable” to the military and from where they launched most attacks.
The terrorists live in a protected enclave, as they have either destroyed villages and towns close to Sambisa or have their cronies or members living there.
There are so many routes, both official and unofficial into Sambisa Game Reserve. There are three official routes through Konduga, Bama and Gwoza local governments. The unofficial routes are more than ten, leading to the three local governments of Konduga, Bama and Gwoza that border the place and Maiduguri, and through Damboa to Gujba in Yobe State. There is an unofficial route that leads through Izge village to Madagali in Adamawa state.
The insurgents started a tactical attack and takeover of all the routes to Sambisa and by this made it hard for any other force to penetrate them. All the surrounding villages to the reserve have been taken over; Malari closest to Maiduguri from the reserve has been attacked by the insurgents severally and many of the residents have fled, leaving only elderly people residing there now. Konduga, a big town next on the route to Sambisa from Maiduguri has been attacked many times and civil servants have been made to flee from there for fear of being killed. Mairamri is the next village, which has been attacked many times over but still has a reasonable number of inhabitants.
But the abandonment of its management, following the Sambisa takeover by Boko Haram insurgents in February 2013, led to the gradual disappearance of animals, lodges collapsed or were destroyed, vegetation invaded roads, and rivers dried up
The once beautiful forest, especially the mountainous region of Gwoza near the Cameroon border with so much tourism potential became haven and evil fortress for the Boko Haram jihadist and in April 2014 the kidnapped hundreds of secondary school girls from Chibok.
