President Goodluck Jonathan and his spin doctors at the Presidency were put on the defensive and are said to have gone on damage control over drive after the shadowy Islamist Boko Haram sect rejected its planned offer of amnesty, in what observers agreed was a major setback in the quest to end the low intensity conflict with the group that has declared war on the Nigerian nation.
In an audio statement, sent to Huhuonline.com via e-mail, a voice purporting to be that of Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, dismissed the call for amnesty saying his group had done nothing wrong and instead accuse President Jonathan of committing atrocities against Muslims. Huhuonline.com could not establish the authenticity of the audio recording which was made in Hausa language, but the voice rendition and the manner of its distribution by e-mail was consistent with previous messages released by the fundamentalist sect, blamed for acts of terrorism which have claimed over 1000 lives, mostly in the northern part of the country.
According to the audio, the group is expressing surprise as to why the Nigerian government is granting them clemency, whereas it is the government that has been committing atrocities against Muslims. “…the Nigerian government is talking about granting us amnesty. What wrong have we done? On the contrary, it is we that should grant you pardon,” the voice believed to be Shekau said in the rambling audio, released late yesterday.
The violence continued yesterday; after four police officers were killed by unknown gunmen in Babangida, headquarters of Tarmuwa Local Government Area of Yobe State. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) quoted the State Police Commissioner Sanusi Rufai as saying the gunmen tried to force their way into the police station, ostensibly to raze it, provoking a shoot-out in which five of the gunmen were killed, while the police lost four men and had some rifles carted away.
Presidential sources told Huhuonline.com that angst and anomie was the distempered mood in Aso Rock upon learning of the amnesty rejection by Boko Haram with the President calling an emergency meeting of his top advisers to come up with a new strategy on the way forward. Jonathan was said to have admonished the vice-president to elicit the support of northern leaders, including major opposition figures like Gen. Muhammed Buhari to bring pressure to bear on the group to reconsider its position.
At the forefront of the clamour for amnesty are the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, the Alhaji Maitama Sule-led Northern Elders’ Forum (NEF) and other eminent Nigerians, such as the chairman of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, and former president and three times presidential candidate of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) in the 2011 presidential election, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, who had urged Nigerians to support the amnesty if it will bring peace.
The amnesty was floated last week after President Jonathan met with his security chiefs and raised a committee to work out the practical modalities for the program. The committee was given two weeks to come up with recommendations but even before the committee went to work; the militants stopped them in their tracks by rejecting the offer, making it a non-starter.
Some prominent Northern elite and rights activists have blamed the federal government for bungling up the amnesty process without laying the necessary groundwork to facilitate the process; saying the rejection was predictable because the government did not do its homework. A prominent northern elite who elected anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the issue, told Huhuonline.com that the government did not secure the much needed Boko Haram buy-in for the process to move forward.
Rather, the federal government erroneously attempted to apply the same boiler-plate template from the Niger Delta amnesty program; which involved, in the main, employing billions of naira of taxpayers’ money to buy peace at all cost. The source even took a swipe at the media for igniting premature celebrations with shouts of hurrah even before any ink has been put to paper.
“Well, I am not surprised. In fact, it should be expected that they (Boko Haram leaders) should reject it because they have reservations about the process. There was a lot of celebration in the media before the thing took off; the government has put the cart before the horse,” he said, adding that the committee set up by the government was another opportunity for the members to enrich themselves using the name of Boko Haram.
One way of proactively engaging the group is to g back to the roadmap for peace which was facilitated by a journalist, Ahmad Salkida; which the group trusted and endorsed as their interlocutor. Negotiations should then be preceded by a committee, which will have the input of the sect and also be recognised by the government. There should be target benchmarks within verifiable timeframes for a cease-fire as the precursor to an end of hostilities before any genuine amnesty program can be implemented.
