Military dismisses Shekau’s audio message

Boko Haram

Nigerians should dismiss the purported audio message from Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau and draw more confidence from the military’s continuing success in the fight against insurgency, the Nigerian military has said.
According to the Defence Headquarters in Abuja, the audio clip is a fake and the Boko Haram sect which it describes as a “devilish and anti-human group” is being decimated by the Nigerian armed forces’ ongoing operations.

In a statement issued on behalf of the armed forces by the Acting Director Defence Information, Colonel Rabe Abubakar on Tuesday, he urged citizens to go about their normal business as all areas liberated from Boko Haram sect’s control can now be freely explored.
“The military viewed as irrelevant and fruitless effort the motive behind the recent audio clip presumably released by Shekau, the acclaimed leader of Boko Haram sects.
“The Armed Forces is using this medium to appeal to the good citizens of Nigeria not to lose sleep over the concocted audio rhetoric of the waning terrorist sect which is a usual antic of a drowning person struggling to hold on to anything to remain afloat.
“The Nigerian Armed Forces is not considering any particular person in the terror group to be much relevant in the ongoing onslaught against insurgency in the North East. Shekau or any of his cohorts would not deter the spate of the military operations to rid the country of criminals hiding under strange religious ideology to kill innocent Nigerians,” he stated.
Stressing that members of the Boko Haram and their strange ideologies are being effectively wiped off in the military’s areas of operation, he advised that Shekau or his impersonators should give serious consideration to surrendering.
“The Armed Forces wishes to reiterate that It is a well known fact that the terrorists have been seriously decimated and the tremendous effort and achievement recorded in the recent time by combined forces of the Nigerian Army and the Air Force is commendable.
“The Armed Forces did not lie about the successes recorded so far in its counterinsurgency operations and for avoidance of doubt, the liberated communities in the North East, which were hitherto under the throes of Boko Haram terrorists, are free for interested person or body to explore.

“The military does re-state that in the recent time a number of Boko Haram members have been surrendering and denouncing radicalization.

“Our candid advice to Shekau or his ghost; cohorts or impersonators is to toll the line of their fellow comrades and surrender now as no more hidden place for him or his criminal gang to operate freely any longer.