WorldStage– Following a major battle on March 18, 2026, Nigerian troops from Operation Hadin Kai recovered detailed operational notebooks from slain Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP) fighters in Mallam Fatori, Borno State, north eastern part of the country.
The recovery occurred after the military successfully repelled a large-scale, five-pronged attack on the 68 Battalion’s defensive area.
The recovered documents provide a rare look into the group’s highly structured internal administration:
The notebooks contain lists of militants mobilized for the attack, specifically documenting their assigned roles and deployment.
Detailed ledgers tracked the issuance of AK-47 rifles and the “signing out” of motorcycles, managed much like corporate assets.
Each fighter’s allocated ammunition was recorded. Notably, one cameraman was listed as having received allocated memory cards instead of bullets.
The notebooks also served as a financial ledger, documenting names of fighters who took loans from the group.
The battle itself resulted in the neutralization of over 80 terrorists, including high-profile commanders such as Abdulrahman Gobara, Mallam Ba Yuram, and Abou Ayyuba. Security analysts have noted that this level of organization—resembling a state-like governing entity with its own “ministries” and record-keeping—parallels structures observed in other Islamic State provinces like Puntland, Somalia.
The documents list fighters mobilised for attacks, their roles, assigned weapons, and allocated ammunition.
According to security analyst and researcher Brant Philip in a social media post on Wednesday, similar practices have been observed in other Islamic State provinces, including Puntland in IS-Somal, indicating a structured approach to operations.The notebooks are part of the evidence collected from areas where ISWAP has carried out attacks in northeastern Nigeria.
