Boko Haram can overrun Nigeria, says Atiku

Former Vice-President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar

A former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, has said the Boko Haram sect can overrun Nigeria, unless Federal Government wakes up to its responsibility of protecting the citizens.

Atiku said this at a media briefing in Abuja, on Monday.

He was speaking on the humanitarian crisis caused by the recent territorial gains made by the insurgents.

Atiku noted that it was pathetic that the Nigerian military which fought a civil war and achieved a total reconciliation and reconstruction within 30 months, was today unable to deal with a five-year-old insurgency.

The former Vice President argued that the nation was suffering from a leadership deficit because five years was more than enough to re-equip the entire military.

According to him, the extremist sect currently controls two local government areas in Yobe, five in Adamawa and about nine in Borno states.

He said, “Ever since these terrorists have been taking over territories, there was never a time the Nigerian military has recovered one inch of any lost territory in these five years.

“Can you imagine a whole country like Nigeria with its armed forces? Not one inch of territory recovered from the terrorists? How can you now convince me that this government has the capacity to recover an inch if in the last five years they have not recovered one inch? Government must rise up to its responsibility of protecting its citizens otherwise the whole of this country can be overrun.”

The APC Presidential aspirant who was flanked by legislators from both chambers of the National Assembly; including a former Governor of Yobe State, Buka Abba-Ibrahim, accused the Federal Government of failing to rise to the occasion.

He also accused the Federal Government of not telling Nigerians what they were entitled to know about what had become of the foreign help to recover the Chibok schoolgirls.

He also said Nigerian had a right to suspect when government was not forthcoming with information, arguing that unless government dealt with the security challenge, other things would suffer.

“For me, I don’t believe really that the government has exerted itself in trying to contain this situation because even if it means the government should move in 10,000 troops to a location to deal decisively with this situation, it should not be shy to do so,” he added.

While berating the Jonathan administration, he said, “This is a government which has allowed a small bunch of small terrorists group for close to five years in this country to operate freely.

“We fought a full blown civil war in 30 months in Nigeria and we achieved total reconciliation and reconstruction in 30 months.

“I also recall when we were in office, such an insurgency arose in Yobe State and the former governor of Yobe State is here, when he was in office, it took us just a few weeks to flush out those insurgents, we dealt with them.”

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