The battle against Boko Haram is intensifying in the run-up to the delayed Nigerian elections.

The terror group appears to be mounting more attacks especially on neighboring border towns along the country's frontier.

Authorities who put back the elections by six weeks because of the threat from the extremist group, have vowed to crush all Boko Haram camps between now and polling day on March 28th.

A five-Nation group of West African countries are now involved in the fight. Nigeria has been joined by Cameroon, Niger, Chad and Benin.

Parts of the town of Fotokol, which continues to be the focus of fighting, have been torn apart - with rows of stalls, homes and vehicles torched. Survivors talk of men being sprayed with bullets as they rose from praying in one of the mosques.

The walls of the mosque have been peppered with holes. One of those who carried the bodies out said 37 men were killed there.

Fotokol is just one of the towns on the border with Nigeria to be invaded and terrorised by the Boko Haram extremist group - and its inhabitants are traumatised.

One inhabitant said he had been too scared to leave his household since the attack five days earlier. Nine members of his household had been killed shortly after early morning prayers.

The stakes are high for the Cameroon military posted along the frontier with their much richer, bigger, more powerful Nigerian neighbour.

They have now been bolstered by troops from Chad, but the battle with the militants is just as fierce. And if they fail, the consequences are devastating - as Fotokol found out.

More Chadian troops are preparing to advance into Nigeria, saying there was a battle still raging over the bridge separating Cameroon from their neighbour.

One Chadian soldier spoke of the fighting as "very dangerous and hard".

"We don't even have time to sleep. The fighting goes on through the night even," he said.

The Cameroon soldiers are fiercely dedicated to their task.

"We will not let Boko Haram enter our country," said one commander. "That will not happen. If I go, then someone else will take my place. There is no other option."