Retired Army General faults Buhari on amnesty for bandits, Boko Haram

A retired General from the Nigerian Army on Saturday faulted President Muhammadu Buhari and northern governors for granting amnesty to bandits, Boko Haram, and other criminal elements in the north. The retired General, a former Director of Army Public Relations, retired Brigadier General Sani Usman, had advocated that the government should make extremist crime perpetrators face prosecution so as to restore justice over their nefarious acts. This, he said, will boost government efforts to contain banditry and terrorism in the country, essentially, in northwest and northeast Nigeria.

Retired Brigadier General Sani Usman in a media interaction on Channels Television at the weekend, monitored from Lagos, decried that bandits and Boko Haram terrorists have been offensive against rural communities and public institutions, including waging war against security operatives of the country. He noted that the bandits and Boko Haram terrorists have destroyed many public properties, killed many citizens and sent millions into internally displaced camps mainly in the north, while the killer herdsmen had expanded the violent trade to other parts of the country. From Chibok to Dapchi in Borno State, to communities in Niger, Kaduna, Zamfara states, students were kidnapped from schools in hundreds, while the kidnappers demand ransom in millions of Naira for the release of the victims.

Usman noted that many were made orphans by bandits and Boko Haram terrorists who killed parents, protesting that “it is very difficult for the surviving families of the victims to accept the idea of reintegrating the repentant bandits and terrorists,” in the society.

He expressed pessimism that there is difference between bandits and Boko Haram terrorists who committed heinous crimes and bandits, or Boko Haram members compelled to repent and submit to amnesty. While endorsing the adoption of kinetic and non-kinetic security approaches in the operations to end banditry and terrorism in the north, the former Director of Army Public Affairs stated that the process must bring a balanced justice to both victims of the bandits or terrorists and the perpetrators of banditry and Boko Haram terrorism, [such that crime will not be rewarded with amnesty by the government].

The retired Army General had declared inter alia: “There should be massive construction of engagement of the people so that they see the need that definitely we cannot go kinetic all the way. “Now that non-kinetic efforts are paying the dividend, how do we integrate that into the society.

“You have to talk about justice for the victims, justice for even the perpetrators of the crimes.”

Usman, however, acknowledged that some bandits or Boko Haram terrorists were compulsorily recruited into the violent activities; and, therefore, emphasised the need to separate this category from the core criminals.

He highlighted:  “Remember that it is not everybody that is in Boko Haram that deliberately entered Boko Haram.

“In those days, they capture towns and coerce people into it.

“So, the level of participation in their nefarious activities varies from one individual to another.

“Therefore, there should be a clear cut, system or process that will distinguish between those that committed heinous crimes and those that were coerced.”