From the Chairman of Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), Borno
State chapter, Bishop Mohammed Naga, came a startling revelation that
no fewer than 33,000 Nigerians sacked from their communities by Boko
Haram since June are still trapped in caves and mountains on Nigeria’s
North-east border in Borno, while many are also stuck in some villages
in Cameroon.
Naga who expressed his frustration on the condition of the displaced
Nigerians, said he was more pained that government did not take any
action to rescue the people, wondering why a government would abandon
its people in a strange land for long and allow them to die in caves and
hills without help. He said, perhaps, those displaced Nigerians, who,
according to him, were predominantly Christians, had become abandoned
property.
The bishop who is also the head Maiduguri-based Pentecostal Believer Covenant Church (PBCC) spoke to Sunday Sun:
“Many of our people who fled communities behind the Gwoza hills into
caves and mountains are dying daily of hunger and starvation. There is
no food, water or shelter for them. They are just there with their
children. When Boko Haram ransacked the Mobile Police Training Camp (at
Limankara, Gwoza), they carted away tear-gas canisters and they are now
using them to suffocate our people in caves to death. It is so
pathetic,”
Residents of communities behind the Gwoza hills, about 135 kilometers
southeast of Maiduguri, Borno capital, fled into villages in
neighbouring Cameroun Republic following coordinated attacks in the
area by Boko Haram between December 2013 and June, 2014. There are
equally others who fled from the central communities in Gamboru/Ngala in
September to Fotoko, another community in Cameroun when Boko Haram
raided their homes.
Checks show that these residents are made up of locals and Nigerians
from different ethnic backgrounds who were engaged in livestock business
and other economic activities in the commercially thriving Gamboru/
Ngala towns. Bishop Naga who hails from Gwoza says the people are bitter
with the presidency over the way they are being treated.
We are bitter with Federal Government
“We the Christians in the northeast especially here in Borno are very
bitter with the government. Our people are like abandoned property. It
beats my imagination that government is not doing anything or saying
anything about thousands of Nigerians in another land especially when
the people are suffering. We cannot judge the government by its
intention but its action and movement or utterances. It is as if Nigeria
no longer want our people and the worse thing is that we don’t even
know where to go. When the 1959 or so plebiscite was conducted, our
people were asked where they wanted to be and we voted for Nigeria. From
the northeast up to Bakassi, our people have the highest number of
votes of those who want to remain with Nigeria. So is it now that the
Nigerian government no longer want us? I am asking this question because
of the way our people are being treated. Government cannot protect our
people and there is also no efforts to rescue those trapped. The
statement from some quarters like Alhaji Mujahideen
Asari Dokubo that they don’t know we exist, that they don’t bloody
care about us, that we can go anywhere quoting the Gideon Okar coup of
1990 is also why our people have been asking this question.
Government politicized Boko Haram
“The truth is that government has politicized Boko Haram issue and
the people are at the receiving end. The government has to come to the
rescue of the people because people don’t know where to go again. They
have been traumatized and devastated. People are dying even of hunger
here. In my area, there are well over 50 big churches, all burnt down,
homes razed and farmlands destroyed.
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