- Safiu Kehinde
Borno State Governor, Babagana Zulum, has claimed alleged presence of Boko Haram informants and collaborators within Nigerian politicians and members of the armed forces.
Zulum disclosed this on Wednesday during an interview on News Central’s Breakfast Central.
While vowing to strengthen the state’s intelligence network and deal with saboteurs “ruthlessly”, the Borno governor decried the politicization of insecurity.
“We have informants and collaborators within the Nigerian armed forces, within the politicians, and within the communities.
“What we shall do is to strengthen our intelligence and to deal with them ruthlessly.
“Let’s remove contractocracy. In six months, we can put an end to this madness. We need not politicise insecurity,” he said.
Zulum further provided statistical data on the infrastructural losses recorded before 2022 on account of insurgency in the state.
According to him, about 5000 classrooms and 300 healthcare facilities were destroyed with 100,000 people turned to widows and orphans.
“Before the year 2022, we lost about 5,000 classrooms to insurgence, we lost about 300 healthcare facilities to insurgence and we harvested a total number of 100,000 widows and orphans.” He said.
Speaking on surrendered insurgents, Zulum admitted that not of them have fully been reformed, but majority are contributing positively.
“I cannot completely say that 100% of those people who have surrendered are doing the right thing, but I want to assure you that over 99% are doing well and are not participating in the ongoing terrorism,” He said
The governor however harped on the need for Nigeria to embrace both kinetic and non-kinetic strategies in tackling insurgency.
He stressed that military force alone would never bring about a total end to insurgency.
“Insurgency will never be ended by kinetic measures alone. We must ensure that the non-kinetic measures are also properly put in place.
“What I mean by non-kinetic measures is social, political, and economic dimensions of the crisis.
“Our ongoing non-kinetic measures have yielded positive results with the support of the Nigerian military.” He said.
While commending the Nigerian military’s role in supporting peace-building efforts, Zulum however faulted the lack of equipment for the military as he held that the insurgents of have a superior technological advantage.
He reiterated his call against politicizing insecurity while charging President Bola Tinubu to pay attention to ground-level intelligence and professional advice from the military.
“The forest guard shall be provided immediately. The President of Nigeria needs to listen to those who can differentiate their left from their right.
“We should not politicise insecurity. The President needs to listen to the people who can tell him the right thing. The President should listen to the army,” he added.