Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) declared Wednesday in Abuja that the Boko Haram insurgency has no religious or ethnic underpinnings, and that the majority of Nigerians now know the truth thanks to appropriate education.
The President remarked when he received Karin Khan, the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, at State House in Abuja, stating that public education had made it plain to the people that Boko Haram was a religious perversion rather than an Islamic philosophy.
“To suggest Western education is unsuitable (Haram) is highly deceptive,” Buhari remarked in a statement signed by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity. That is why we are waging war on them and educating the public. Education is critical. Religion and ethnicity are not taken into consideration.
Some people have simply made it a way of life to bring chaos, devastation, and death.”
President Buhari tells the ICC prosecutor that “with appropriate education, people now know that Boko Haram is neither about religion nor ethnicity.”
“God is righteous. You can’t slaughter people without shouting Allah Akbar (God is great). Either you don’t know anything about God or you’re just plain foolish.
“It is quite deceptive to imply that Western education is unacceptable (Haram).” That is why we are waging war on them and educating the public. And we’re having a lot of success. We took office at a time when things were dire, but we are teaching the public.
Education is critical. Religion and ethnicity are not taken into consideration. Some people have simply made it a way of life to bring chaos, devastation, and death.”
In his remarks, the ICC Prosecutor compared extremism to a cancer that can spread but can shrink, stating that what Boko Haram and the Islamic State of West African Province do is “religious perversion.”
He said the ICC believes in complementarity, which “promotes collaboration over confrontation,” and advised Nigeria and other Sahel/Lake Chad basin countries to lobby the UN Security Council to refer atrocities committed by terrorist groups operating in the region to the ICC for investigation and trial.
