'Fanatic' Boko Haram leader uses brutality to build infamy

The man who abducted hundreds of schoolgirls in Nigeria is a violent fiend with a lust for infamy.

The fanatic also shares a complicated relationship with his mother.

According to news.com.au, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau was sneering and cackling like a lunatic in his videos

He is also determined to gain worldwide fame through acts of extreme brutality.

The kidnapping of more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls has turned the eyes of the world on Shekau, the attention he was so desperately seeking for.

Shekau, thought to be in his late 30s or early 40s, is America's most wanted man in Africa, with a seven million dollars bounty on his head.

It's the largest-ever reward offered for someone in Africa.

By comparison, the FBI placed a 25 million dollars bounty on Osama bin Laden.

Former US State Department counterterrorism chief Daniel Benjamin said Shekau seems to want to distinguish himself by the depth of his brutality.

Shekau was second in command of Boko Haram for years, and grabbed control after police killed leader Mohammad Yusuf in 2009.

The group, name roughly translates as "Western Education is a Sin", has killed more than 7000 people in the past two years, the report added.