... Bandits different from insurgents, says ex-Chief of Army staff
SHEHU of Borno, Abubakar El-Kanemi, has described the Boko Haram insurgency in the country as the handiwork of foreigners, who penetrated the Northeast region in the guise of seeking to acquire Quranic education.
The traditional ruler, who spoke at a town hall meeting organised by Yateem Faqeer Global Foundation in Abuja, yesterday, said the people of the region had suffered so much in the hands of the insurgents.
According to him, "Borno has witnessed so many things, both good and bad. Boko Haram is something meaningless, mindless and without any sense of direction as none of the Holy Books, either Quran or the Bible, indicates that you show disrespect to others, burn and destroy their property. And I want people to know that Boko Haram was never initiated or started by people of the North-East Zone. It is something they just brought to us from nowhere.
"Boko Haram insurgents came to Borno and the North-East in the guise of acquiring Quranic education while not many did not know they had an ideology which was polluted as well as promoted into the minds of the youths, and created havoc in our area."
In the same breath, former Chief of Army Staff, General Alwali Kazir (retd) dismissed insinuations that the bandits and other armed criminal gangs operating in the Northwest and other parts of the country were the offshoots of Boko Haram insurgents in the North East, insisting that apparent ideological differences separated them.
Nevertheless, he recommended both kinetic and non-kinetic approaches as panacea to Nigeria's insecurity.
Also speaking, National Coordinator, National Social Investment Programme, NSIP, Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Dr. Umar Bindir, called for the formulation of a 15-year regional policy and strategy to rehabilitate and develop the North East region post-Boko Haram era.
On her part, Chairperson of Yateem Faqeer Global Foundation, Hajiya Yagana Hassan, said the mission of the humanitarian organisation was to serve humanity and to provide sustainable economic assistance to communities affected by insecurity to help them fight extreme poverty amongst other challenges.
