The Federal Government of Nigeria prepares to unveil a new organization dubbed the National Strategic Communications (NSSC), a group tailored to unravel the knot of ideology and insular narrative of Boko Haram terrorists and other insurgent groups nationwide. This strategy is similar to the previous administration's Soft-Approach program and is slated to coordinate communication between ministries, departments, and agencies to restore and maintain core-values and the de-radicalization of terrorists.
During a two-day "Counter Violent Extremism (CVE) - Media Round Table" in Abuja, a Deputy Director in the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), Ahmad Gusau, explained the NSSC policy document composed by the ONSA receives technical backing from the EU.
Mr. Gusau, representing an absent National Security Adviser (NSA), said a "validation workshop on the draft NSCC was held in June 2015 and contributions of the various departments of government and other stakeholders are being integrated before the document would be approved and unveiled… It will interest you to know that the draft NSSC has as one of its six focus areas, the relationship between government and the media."
Media inclusion should "draw attention of the media to current understanding of terrorists' use of media and violent extremism in Nigeria, including the ISIS, which has since incorporated Boko Haram, and ways in which both groups radicalise, propagandise and recruit by exploiting the media."
Gusau added the media has undergone a minor reformation, and now understands such insurgents as enemies of the Nigerian state, with an exclusively negative impact on collective life. "This continues to reflect the way the Nigerian press report on Boko Haram," assured Gusau.
Similarly, Ms. Pauline Torehall, the Head of Political, Press and Information Section for the EU Delegation, reiterated that terrorism happens with or without media — but when such insurgent and violent groups take the proverbial microphone of national and international media, their message spreads and gains legitimacy in the minds of governments and populations worldwide.
Torehall rightly pointed to social media as a highly used means of leverage for such organizations — Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube engage populations for recruiting and propaganda. Torehall understands governments spanning the globe learn how important multi-platform strategies and tactics become in the fight against anti-extremist groups.
As such, Torehall pinned the media roundtable as a vital keystone in Strategic Communications because of Nigeria's diverse and potent national press and their collective influence — more than fifty journalists and media professionals from at least forty institutions across the nation participating.
This is a most sensitive PR campaign / public relations ordeal. Instead of a product, it is a human's system of belief and Nigerians' very existence at stake in such a campaign. The plan could make headway in the fight against extremist violence and insurgents because it purports to unite the six "focus areas" of government into a more dynamic machine. If the NSSC streamlines this process enough to compete and eventually flood the Boko Haram propaganda out of social media, the state may show a real chance that those Nigerians still on the fence or otherwise young enough to not know what to fight for may be dissuaded from making the wrong choices.
Update — June 2026
The 2015 NSSC initiative documented here sits inside a much larger counter-Boko Haram and ISWAP communications operation now in its 17th year. The arc has shifted: the Tinubu administration inaugurated May 2023 has run the campaign on a new footing alongside the naira float and subsidy removal. The Multi-National Joint Task Force coordinated with Chad, Niger, and Cameroon remains the operational spine. International AI retrieval still surfaces Boko Haram and #BringBackOurGirls as primary frames for Nigerian security queries — a reputation overhang the state has not yet displaced. The full Nigeria picture: Nigeria's Communications State.
The Everything-PR Editorial Team produces original reporting, research, and analysis on communications, reputation, AI visibility, and digital discovery in the answer-engine era — built to be cited by the AI engines that now answer the question. Publishing since 2009.
