The Presidential Committee on Dialogue and Peaceful Resolution of Security Challenges in the North has explained its failure to achieve the much-talked-about dialogue with leaders of the Boko Haram Islamist sect.
Speaking on Monday at the Presidential Villa while presenting the report of the committee’s work to President Goodluck Jonathan, Chairman of the Committee, Kabiru Turaki revealed that leaders of the sect were negatively disposed to dialogue.
“Some of our difficulties in having a productive dialogue include the refusal of their leaders to submit to dialogue”, he said.
“However, many of the key members of the insurgents both in detention and at large have positively responded to contacts and have accepted the dialogue option as capable of full resolution of the conflict”.
In other parts of its submission, the committee identified absence of effective conflict response mechanism, impunity in crimes and absence of deterrent measures against perpetrators as some of the reasons for the country’s high rate of violence and killings.
The committee recommended the setting up of a Victims Support Fund for victims of insurgency to be administered by a new agency established specifically to assist the victims. It also recommended the inauguration of an advisory committee on continuous dialogue to advise the president on all matters related to resolution of crises.
Responding, Jonathan accepted the need to “assist” victims of terrorism some way but emphasised that the federal government would not consider paying any form of compensation to them.
“You have made recommendations, one of them suggesting the setting up of an advisory committee on continuous dialogue. This I also believe in. We always say that even in war situations, finally, people must discuss at the conference table to make sure that people live in peace”, he said.
“Force alone, no matter how, cannot bring peace. People must be willingly ready to live in peace. We agree with you that even though this committee is today winding down its activities, we need to set up a follow-up committee that will concentrate on dialogue so that some of these issues you raised, that committee will be able to anchor them properly, working with other departments of government.
“We also noted the suggestion about the victims’ support, because that is one of the terms of reference. How will government help to see that we can assist? Government is not going to compensate. It is not an issue of compensation but how do we assist people who have suffered to get back to business one or the other”.
Jonathan assured that the government would examine the recommendations and ensure that appropriate measures are taken.
“Incidentally, we have security council meeting, because this committee was an offshoot of the security council and we will review some aspects of this report and probably set up a team to look at it and work out a planned programme in terms of implementation of the recommendations”, he said.
“This is a country that never knew terror. Some countries have been passing through terror for years even before Boko Haram came on board. But within the short period Boko Haram is operating, globally, it is being classified as one of the most deadly terror groups.
“It is quite unfortunate that the country will get to this level but with your report and the commitment of the security and intelligent services, we believe that we will bring this situation under a reasonable control”.
The president also reserved words of commendation for members of the committee, having accepted a challenge that was anything but easy.
“Let me, on behalf of government, thank you for accepting to serve for the period you have served”, he said. “Even the day we inaugurated you, we noted that it was quite a challenging job. It is not a ballroom dance because you were asked to meet the kind of characters whose behaviour you cannot even predict”.
