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Malam Garba Shehu, who served as spokesman of President Muhammadu Buhari till he died in July, has countered ex-President Goodluck Jonathan who said the insurgents nominated Buhari as a mediator.
Speaking at the launch of “Scars: Nigeria’s Journey and the Boko Haram Conundrum”, a book authored by former Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Lucky Irabor (rtd), Jonathan had said Boko Haram insurgents once chose Buhari to represent them in negotiations with the Federal Government.
Reflecting on the insurgency that defined much of his presidency, Jonathan said his administration had established several committees to explore options for peace with Boko Haram.
But responding after the story went viral, Shehu dismissed Jonathan’s claim, accusing the former President of targeting 2027 votes.
“We are compelled to make a response to a terrible statement made on the late President Muhammadu Buhari by his predecessor in office, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, to the effect that Boko Haram had nominated him to represent them in a dialogue with government.
“If this is a campaign statement towards his bid for the presidency in 2027, we want to say to him that “Mr. Jonathan, you are making a false start.”
“Muhammed Yusuf or Abubakar Shekau, the deceased leaders of the Boko Haram terrorist group, never nominated Muhammadu Buhari for any such role. In fact, Shekau routinely denounced and threatened Buhari, and their ideologies were in direct opposition.
“In 2014, Muhammadu Buhari escaped a bomb attack on his life by Boko Haram in Kaduna, in which his personal staff suffered various degrees of injury. Buhari’s campaigns focused on fighting Boko Haram and restoring security to Nigeria whenever he became president, putting him in direct opposition to the terrorist group’s leader.
“Contrary to the news making the rounds in those years that the radical Islamist extremist –Boko Haram had nominated General Muhammadu Buhari as the mediator between them and the Federal Government of Nigeria in the proposed peace talk, the retired Military General denied knowledge of his nomination.
“In a statement issued by the then National Secretary of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Engr Buba Galadima, Buhari, the national leader of the CPC said he not aware of the appointment: “As at 10pm yesterday (Thursday) when I spoke with him, he said he has not even heard about it,” Galadima said.
“Continuing, the party secretary told reporters the “he (Buhari) said the whole thing to him, is just speculation. And since nobody has contacted him as a person for him to even know who is behind what, and what the motives of the whole exercise are, he would not speak to the press.” He revealed that Buhari, the 2011 presidential candidate of the CPC, further told him that as an elder statesman and a patriotic Nigerian, he will continue to pray until peace and tranquillity return to Nigeria.”
Shehu explained that the claim which he described as “misleading information” started after a faction of the terrorist group, possibly sponsored by Buhari’s opponents, staged a press conference in Maiduguri, Borno State, through a certain Abu Mohammed Ibn Abdulaziz, who claimed to be the Boko Haram commander in charge of Southern and Northern Borno.
According to Shehu Abdulaziz had claimed that the sect would prefer Buhari; the late Bukar Abba Ibrahim; first Nigerian Minister of Petroleum; Shettima Ali Monguno, also late, Chairman of the Presidential Committee on Insecurity in the North-East, Ambassador Gaji Gatimari, and other prominent members of the Borno Emirate to mediate between them and the federal government.
“Abdulaziz was roundly condemned by the leaders of Boko Haram who claimed that he had “no mandate of their leader, Imam Abubakar Shekau,” Shehu said.
Shehu ended by saying, “To win in 2027, Dr. Jonathan should look for a better story to tell Nigerians.”
