Negotiating With Terrorists A Mistake Nigeria Cannot Afford To Keep Making

By Reno Omokri

I have just watched a video by Shuaibu Moni, a Boko Haram commander who was reported by the media to have been freed in exchange for some 82 kidnapped Chibok girls in a deal allegedly brokered by the Swedish government. The fact that a Boko Haram commander released by the Buhari government can threaten Nigeria proves that you should not negotiate with terrorists or pay ransoms to them.

 

By doing so, you become the major financier of terrorism knowingly or unknowingly! In this video, Mr. Moni threatened Nigeria and vowed to show the country that Boko Haram is still fully in control of Sambisa Forest, contrary to claims made by the military and President Muhammadu Buhari. This latest video proves the futility of negotiating with terrorists. 

Terrorists cannot be trusted and any negotiation or ransom payments will only come back to haunt you as we have seen in Mr. Moni’s latest video. Under the Buhari administration, nearly a thousand so called ‘repentant’ Boko Haram members have been freed. How many of them were truly repentant? How does a government justify releasing hardened criminals who by the principle of Taqiyya, are permitted by their extremist interpretation of their religion, to deceive their enemies in order to undermine them?

Has the Buhari government offered the same liberty to repentant IPOB members, Shiites and other minority/religious activists? What is so special to the Buhari administration about Boko Haram that this government keeps on releasing members of one of the most deadly terrorists in the world?

I hereby call on the Buhari administration to put a stop to this unusual practice of releasing deadly terrorists. I also call on the government to halt any payments to Boko Haram or any other terrorist group if they have been making such payments. Who knows whether it was moneys paid as ransom to Boko Haram or individuals freed by the government that were used to facilitate the kidnap of the Dapchi Girls and the recent killings of United Nations staff in Rann. Again I urge the Federal Government not to unwittingly become a lifeline to Boko Haram.