Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo on Tuesday said the Boko Haram sect was no longer a serious fighting force, despite the ugly incidents witnessed recently in Dapchi, Yobe State and Rann, Borno State.
The sect had abducted 110 pupils from Government Science and Technical Girls College, Dapchi; and killed United Nations’ aid workers rendering humanitarian service in Rann, Kalabalge Local Government Area of Borno State.
Osinbajo, however, said the separate incidents were not indications that the government was fighting a war that cannot be won.
He spoke at the opening of the Eighth National Security Seminar 2018 organised by the Alumni Association of the National Defence College in Abuja.
He stood in for President Muhammadu Buhari at the event with the theme “Fighting Tomorrow’s Warfare Today.”
The Vice-President said the terrorists, who he described as “faceless,” were capable of doing anything to continue to get media attention, which he said was their oxygen.
He said, “Today’s enemies, loosely-structured non-state actors, sometimes faceless, choose to mutate.
“They will alter their goals and objectives at random, and are capable of doing anything and everything to continue feeding off the oxygen of media attention.
“Yet, this should not be interpreted as meaning that we are fighting an unwinnable war.
“We can boldly say that today, Boko Haram is no longer a serious fighting force.”
Despite the latest incidents, Osinbajo said there should be no room for self-pity or frustration on the part of government.
According to him, the Dapchi and Rann incidents should, if anything, rekindle the determination of the government and the Armed Forces to permanently subdue terrorism in Nigeria.
Osinbajo said since the incidents happened, Nigeria’s security and intelligence chiefs have all mobilised to Yobe State and environs, and have been re-assessing their strategies and approaches to securing lives and property and containing the threat the sect poses.
He said government was, more than ever before, mobilising to ensure that schools in the North East are kept secure from Boko Haram.
