NEWS
Boko Haram/ISWAP: FG reacts to Obasanjo’s claim on islamization, fulanization of Nigeria/Africa
The federal
government has asked former president Olusegun Obasanjo to withdraw his recent
comments which imputed ethno-religious motive to Boko Haram, ISWAP, terrorism
in the country, as well as apologise to Nigerians.
We had
reported that Obasanjo on Saturday decried
the high level of insecurity in Nigeria, stating that the Federal
Government alone cannot tackle the menace.
He regretted that
both Boko Haram and herdsmen acts of violence were not treated as they should
at the beginning.
According to him,
“They have both incubated and developed beyond what Nigeria cannot handle alone.
They are now combined and internationalized with ISIS in control.
“It is no longer an
issue of lack of education and lack of employment for our youths in Nigeria
which it began as, it is now West African fulanization, African Islamization
and global organized crimes of human trafficking, money laundering, drug
trafficking, gun trafficking, illegal mining and regime change.”
But reacting in a
statement issued in Abuja on Tuesday, the Minister of Information and Culture,
Alhaji Lai Mohammed, averred that such “indiscreet, deeply offensive and
patently divisive comments are far below the status of an elder statesman”.
He added that, “It
is particularly tragic that a man who fought to keep Nigeria one is the same
one seeking to exploit the country’s fault lines to divide it in the twilight
of his life”.
The minister stated
that Boko Haram and ISWAP are terrorist organisations pure and simple, adding
that they care little about ethnicity or religion when perpetrating their
senseless killings and destruction.
”Since the Boko
Haram crisis, which has been simmering under the watch of Obasanjo, boiled over
in 2009, the terrorist organisation has killed more Muslims than adherents of
any other religion.
“The terrorist
group blown up more mosques than any other houses of worship and is not known
to have spared any victim on the basis of their ethnicity.
“It is therefore
absurd to say that Boko Haram and its ISWAP variant have as their goal the
‘Fulanisation and Islamisation’ of Nigeria, West Africa or Africa,” he said.
Mohammed pointed
out that President Muhammadu Buhari put to rest the mis-characterization of
Boko Haram as an Islamic organisation when he said, in his inaugural speech in
2015, that ”Boko Haram is a mindless, godless group who are as far away from
Islam as one can think of”.
He reiterated that
Obasanjo’s comments were therefore, “as insensitive and mischievous as they are
as offensive and divisive in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country like
Nigeria”.
“It is wondering
whether there is no limit to how far the former President will go in throwing
poisonous darts at his perceived political enemies.”
The minister noted
that Obasanjo’s prescriptions for ending the Boko Haram/ISWAP crisis, which
include seeking assistance outside the shores of Nigeria, are coming several
years late.
He said President
Buhari had done that and more since assuming office, “hence, the phenomenal
success he has recorded in tackling the terrorists”.
”Shortly after
assuming office in 2015, President Buhari’s first trips outside the country
were to rally the support of Nigeria’s neighbours – Benin, Cameroon, Chad and
Niger – for the efforts to battle the terrorists.
“The President also
rallied the support of the international community, starting with the G7, and
then the US, France
and the UN.
and the UN.
”That explains the
massive degrading of Boko Haram, which has since lost its capacity to carry out
the kind of spectacular attacks for which it became infamous, and the recovery
of every inch of captured Nigerian territory from the terrorists,” he said.
The Minister also
noted that Obasanjo’s call for wide consultations with various groups as part
of the efforts to tackle the Boko Haram crisis has been neutralised by his
ill-advised comments which have served more to alienate a large number of
Nigerians, who are offended by his tactless and distasteful postulation.
He called on the
former president, whom he said took bullets for Nigeria’s unity, not to allow
personal animosity to override his love for a united Nigeria.
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The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed has said despite the challenges facing the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration since coming to office in May 2015, the government has not retrenched a single worker.