TRUE/FALSE: Boko Haram has been totally defeated – President Buhari

[jchima]

President Muhammadu Buhari has informed the international community about Nigeria’s progress in the fight against terrorism.

In a statement issued by Femi Adesina, the president’s special adviser on media and publicity, Buhari made his speech at the ongoing sixth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD VI) in Nairobi, Kenya.



The president also informed that Nigeria will diligently ensure full rehabilitation of victims of Boko Haram and find lasting solutions to combat threats of terrorism in the country.

The statement read in part: “The bottom line is that these problems are our primary responsibility. We must tackle them and find lasting solutions for ourselves.”

Accordingly, President Buhari told the summit attended by Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, some 35 African leaders and chief executives of at least 80 major companies from Japan, that international cooperation with Nigeria was central in the decimation of Boko Haram terror group.

He said: “I took over the mantle of leadership in Nigeria when the North-Eastern part of the country was being ravaged by Boko Haram.

“However, soon after assumption of office, our administration with the support of our immediate neighbours — Chad, Cameroon, Niger and Benin- and international partners including Japan, faced the challenge frontally.

“As I speak, the terror group has been decimated and life is beginning to return to normal in the affected region. The challenge we currently face which is also being addressed, is that of the IDPs which number over two million to get them re-integrated with their families and their original homes.”

On global health issues, which is a major focal point of the summit, President Buhari expressed special appreciation to the government of Japan for its contribution of $800 million to the fight against malaria, tuberculosis among others.

The contribution is part of the 1.3 billion dollars made available to the Nigerian health sector by the Global Fund.

On the gains of TICAD, the president noted that partnerships between Africa and Japan will help create and improve investment opportunities in industries, agriculture, information technology, science and technology among others for the good of the continent and investors from Japan.

“In view of the challenges Africa is facing, the imperative for a viable partnership like the Tokyo International Conference on African Development cannot be over emphasized.

“Today, many countries in Africa including the oil producing ones are wisely seeking to diversify their economies away from mono-cropping.

“In Nigeria, our Administration has already taken concrete steps to diversify the economy by making agriculture not just a development programme but a thriving business.

“Investing in the economies of this continent especially through Public-Private-Partnership can contribute to building capacity for our economies,” the president added.

The 2-day summit with the theme Advancing Africa’s Sustainable Development Agenda-TICAD Partnership for Prosperity, is being held outside of Japan for the first time since its inception in 1993.

Among other things, TICAD aims to solve Africa’s development problems through quality technology in the health, industry, agriculture and environment sectors.

A draft declaration to be adopted at end of the summit will seek to combat the growing threats of terrorism, conflicts and violent radicalism through the promotion of education and job creation.

Sadly for Buhari, some Nigerians are demanding the return of former president, Goodluck Jonathan following the present state of the Nigerian economy.

The clamour for Jonathan’s return was triggered by statement credited to Reno Omokri, the former special assistant on new media to Jonathan, that the former president handed over the best Nigerian government and the largest economy in Africa to President Buhari.

Reno Omokri, in a series of tweets on Wednesday, August 24, highlighted some favourable conditions which were existed when Jonathan handed over the reins of power to the Buhari-led administration.

Omokri said the Nigerian economy was booming when Jonathan handed over to Buhari, adding that trains were working when the present administration took over from the Jonathan administration.

Source: TRUE/FALSE: Boko Haram has been totally defeated – President Buhari – LATEST NAIJA NEWS – Nigeria News | Breaking News | Today News

 

[PK1]

What you say?
I say FALSE.

 

[Pilate]

Unlikely.

 

[blastoff]

Maybe the Boko JVs but the Varsity's likely in training camp.

 

[waltky]

Some kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls may have been used as human shields...

Nigerian Army: Boko Haram May Have Used Chibok Girls as Shields During Attack
Thursday 29th December, 2016 - Boko Haram militants kidnapped more than 200 girls from their school dormitories in the town of Chibok in April 2014.

The first of the girls to be found said most of them were being held in the Sambisa forest, where she was discovered in May. The group has kidnapped hundreds of men, women and children during its seven-year insurgency aimed at creating an Islamic state in northeast Nigeria, some of whom may also be held in the forest. The abduction of the Chibok girls, 21 of whom were released in October, brought worldwide notoriety.

Stronghold reportedly captured

President Muhammadu Buhari said Saturday that the Islamist militants' last enclave in the forest, the vast former game reserve in northeast Nigeria that was their stronghold, had been captured. Reuters has been unable to independently verify that the area has been captured, but the comments from the general were the first reference by a military official to the suspected whereabouts of the girls since Buhari's announcement. The president said the capture of Camp Zero in the forest marked the 'final crushing of Boko Haram,' but security analysts say the group's ability to carry out attacks in neighboring Niger, Cameroon and Chad suggests it has multiple bases.

They also say the group split this year with one faction led by Abubakar Shekau operating from the Sambisa forest and the other, allied to Islamic State and led by Abu Musab al-Barnawi, based in the Lake Chad region. Irabor said the military was pursuing those who fled, adding that 1,240 people suspected of being militants, their relatives or sympathizers had been arrested between Dec. 21 and 28.

Boko Haram has killed 15,000 people and displaced more than 2 million during its insurgency. It controlled an area the size of Belgium in early 2015, but has been pushed back by troops from Nigeria and neighboring countries since then. Separately, dozens of Boko Haram fighters have given themselves up to authorities in southern Niger, the interior minister there said.

Nigerian Army Boko Haram May Have Used Chibok Girls as Shields During Attack

 

[waltky]

Boko Haram leader denies jihadis are crushed...

Boko Haram leader says violent campaign continues
Dec 31,`16 -- Boko Haram's leader has declared in a new video that he is alive, denying Nigerian government claims that his Islamic extremist group has been crushed.

President Muhammadu Buhari said last week that soldiers had driven Boko Haram from its last forest enclave in the northeast, boasting "the terrorists are on the run, and no longer have a place to hide." In a video posted on YouTube, Abubakar Shekau announced: "I am here, well and alive" and that "the battle is just beginning." He urged his followers, in graphic terms, to continue the campaign.

Nigeria's military has claimed to have killed Shekau at least three times, and earlier this year declared he had been fatally wounded. This week, the army said it seized Shekau's Quran in the Sambisa Forest assault - wanting to indicate he was on the run. Each time such claims are made, the Boko Haram leader reappears in a video to mock them.

In the latest, posted on YouTube on Dec. 29, he reiterates that "our mission is to establish an Islamic caliphate" in Nigeria - whose 180 million people are divided almost equally between mainly Muslims in the north and a predominantly Christian south. In the video, Shekau does not mention some 200 schoolgirls kidnapped from a school in Chibok town who were believed to be held in the Sambisa Forest.

Nigeria is unlikely to see an end soon to the deadly suicide bombings, village attacks and assaults on remote military outposts in northeastern Nigeria. The Islamic State group, to which one faction of Boko Haram belongs, announced an attack on an army barracks "killed and wounded many" soldiers on Dec. 22 - the same day the army said it seized the forest hideout.

Already, there are reports that the insurgents have been regrouping south of their northeastern stronghold. The seven-year-old Islamic uprising has killed more than 20,000 people, spread across Nigeria's borders, driven 2.6 million from their homes and created a humanitarian disaster with some 5 million people facing starvation.

News from The Associated Press