Boko Haram Kpalava: No amnesty for insurgents —Military

Chief of the Air Staff, CAS, Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar, yesterday, clarified that the military had no amnesty for Boko Haram insurgents, insisting that the Operation Safe Corridor for repentant insurgents was also not automatic.

While the Air Chief said that only the political authority was in position to grant amnesty, the military was offering this programme to help the repentant insurgents, but insisted that they must face the processes of law to benefit. The Defence Headquarters, DHQ, had earlier in the week, announced the Operation Safe Corridor programme to rehabilitate, empower and reintegrate repentant Boko Haram insurgents into the society, but it was otherwise taken to mean amnesty. However, addressing a press conference in Abuja, as part of activities lined up to celebrate the Nigerian Air Force, NAF, at 52, the Air Chief said that there were laid down lawful procedures for such programme and that they would be judiciously followed in order not to put Nigeria in jeopardy.

Part of this is profiling and disarmament, which he said any insurgent were willing to come out would surely undergo. “If you want to come out, we will profile you. We will disarm you and make you go through the processes of law. The idea is that those who are willing to stop fighting surrender and go through our processes”, Abubakar said. Already, he stressed that the insurgents were tired of fighting due to the intensity of military operations and were already surrendering in large numbers. The CAS reassured on the commitment of the Nigerian Air Force, NAF, to swiftly eliminate the remnants of insurgents in the North East. He said although there were still pockets of insurgent attacks on soft targets, the battle was already being won, urging local communities to offer credible intelligence to security forces. “Looking at where we are coming from, I think we have done substantially well. In those days in 2014, you had convoy of vehicles moving round villages and killing Nigerians but it is no longer so.

“I believe that very soon, God willing, we shall come to the end of this problem. We are at the tail end of this operation” he said. Abubakar added that available intelligence showed that many of the terrorists were exhausted and want to stop fighting, saying that some of them are trapped and they do not know how to come out. According to him, it was this development that made the Defence Headquarters to create the Operation safe corridor for repentant Boko Haram fighters. He maintained that the corridor was meant only for those willing to surrender their arms and be reintegrated into the society. “So, we came up with the idea of ‘safe corridor.’

If you want to come out, come out and then we profile you, keep you under watch before taking the next step. So many of them are surrendering in large numbers. We have seen that they are surrendering because they know that there is no escape,” he stated. On whether the leader of the group is still alive or using a look-alike in releasing propaganda videos, the Air Chief said that the Defence Intelligence Agency DIA was currently analysing the latest Shekau video to make “sense” of what is contained therein. He said despite the enormous challenges caused by the situation in the Northeast, the air force was not overwhelmed, as in the last nine months, its fighter jets in the area have flown for over 3, 000 hours which translated to a consumption of 3.7m litres of Jet A1 fuel.

He said highlights of the 52nd celebration which holds from April 12-15 in Bauchi state would be lectures, novelty match, flypast, CAS open forum, reunion variety night, CAS awards, jumat prayers, church service and humanitarian outreach. There would also be a reunion of serving and retired officers in order to brainstorm on key challenges, hence the team of the anniversary, “Reuniting for Enhanced Service Delivery and Operational Effectiveness.” Abubakar said lessons drawn from the reunion would form the basis for the review of its tactics in tackling emerging challenges in the 21st century. Established in 1964 by an Act of Parliament, the Nigerian AirForce was designed to be a full complement of Nigeria’s military defence system.