Contrary to the news making the rounds that the Boko Haram sect has nominated Former Head of States, General Muhammadu Buhari as
the mediator between them and the Federal Government of Nigeria in the
proposed peace talk, the retired Military General has denied knowledge
of his nomination.
According to the National Secretary of the Congress for Progressive
Change (CPC) Engr Buba Galadima, the national leader of the CPC is not
aware of the appointment: “As at 10pm yesterday (Thursday) when I spoke
with him,he said he has not even heard about it.”
Galadima said: “He (Buhari) said the whole thing to him, is just
speculation. And since nobody has contacted him as a person for him to
even know who is behind what, and what are the motives of the whole
exercise, he would not speak to the press.”
He revealed that Buhari, the 2011 presidential candidate of the CPC,
further told him that as an elder statesman and a patriotic Nigerian, he
will continue to pray until peace and tranquillity return to Nigeria.
It would be recalled that the sect had said in a telephone press
conference in Maiduguri, Borno State, through Abu Mohammed Ibn
Abdulaziz, who claimed to be the Boko Haram commander in charge of
Southern and Northern Borno that they would prefer the former military
leader, General Muhammadu Buhari, ex-Yobe State governor and now
Senator, Bukar Abba Ibrahim, first Nigerian Minister of Petroleum,
Shettima Ali Monguno, Chairman of the Presidential Committee on
Insecurity in the North-East, Ambassador Gaji Gatimari, and other
prominent members of the Borno Emirate to mediate between them and the
federal government.
Abdulaziz claimed he had the mandate of their leader, Imam Abubakar
Shekau, disclosing that the sect was highly offended due to what
happened three years ago (referring to the killing of the sect’s leader,
Mallam Mohammed Yusuf).
Speaking on to the development, the CPC national publicity secretary,
Mr. Rotimi Fashekun, has lambasted President Goodluck Jonathan and the
ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) over Buhari’s nomination.
Fashekun described Buhari’s purported nomination as “the latest
gambit in the desire of this organically corrupt PDP-led Federal
Government in diverting the attention of the unsuspecting Nigerian
public from the on-going massive looting of their common patrimony.”
Fashekun also said: “Without any scintilla of equivocation, General
Muhammadu Buhari has never been directly or remotely connected with any
insurrection or insurgency against the Nigerian nation and her people.
He remains the quintessential patriot that continues to magnetise the
very best across the ethno-religious boundaries within the Nigerian
nation-space.”
The party chieftain accused the PDP of being responsible for the
growing insecurity in the country, insisting: “As we have stated in an
earlier communication, the (PDP), as a corporate entity, is the
harbinger of the insecurity travails of the Nigerian people for the sole
reason of ensuring perpetuity in governance.”
Fashekun listed the three categories of Boko Haram and alleged that the PDP-led government is sponsoring one of them.
“From recollection of events of the last two years, there
are three variants of the Boko Haram: the original Boko Haram that is
at daggers drawn with the Nigerian authority for the extra-judicial
killing of their leader; the criminal Boko Haram that is involved in all
criminality for economic reasons and of course, the most lethal of all,
the Political Boko Haram, which this PDP-led Federal Government
represents.
“The President, Goodluck Jonathan, had once alerted the nation of the
ubiquitous presence of Boko Haram in his government, a fact aptly
amplified by his erstwhile National Security Adviser, General Andrew
Azazi.” He further drew instances from the revelations made by State
Security Service.
Undoubtedly, the latest revelations by the State
Security Services (SSS) on the complicity of the top echelon of the PDP
leadership in Boko Haram activities aptly bear testimony of the noxious
subterfuge to extirpate the essence of our nationhood, he said.