DAVID MARK ON BOKO HARAM

Will this conference avoid what may be regarded as sensitive issues and not discuss them? Will we be able to condemn current degree of insecurity in the North occasioned and heightened by Boko Haram?

Are we afraid to openly condemn Boko Haram either for political reasons or out of fear of possible attack by the sect? How can we keep quiet when a group begins to propagate the ideology that Western education is Haram? Western education today remains the pivot of development.

Have we forgotten that evil thrives when good men are silent? A Northerner killing a Northerner, a Northerner maiming a Northerner, a Northerner disrupting business activities in the North, a Northerner destroying properties in the North and so on and so forth cannot be helping the North by any stretch of imagination. Can this help Northern cause?

As a people who desire to live together, we are bound to have problems but we can overcome these if we are sincere. Sincerity of purpose, consistency, transparency and honesty are all necessary ingredients to ensure peace and coexistence in the North; sincerity on the part of our religious leaders. We must demonstrate this in words and in deeds, and we must show that we are serious about this.

As leaders, we sometimes have to take decisions that are painful but necessary. We must be courageous even we are threatened. Can we truly say that we have done this?

Won’t we be able to condemn current degree of insecurity in the North occasioned and heightened by Boko Haram? Are we afraid to openly condemn Boko Haram either for political reasons or out of fear of possible attack by the sect? 

If the elders in the North cannot speak out and stop this menace let them tell us. Let them come out and say so boldly, because the belief out there is that some elders know about these people and decide to keep quite. If care is not taking, the way things are going, if the Boko Haram menace is not halted, it can lead to break up of Nigeria. Because there is an extent to which the people can take it.

It is all about religious fundamentalism and ideology. Poverty is not the cause, otherwise if every poor person decides to carry arms then Nigeria will seize to exist. So if people talk about poverty and hunger as the cause of the Boko Haram menace I say no.

I think it is time we educate the suicide bombers in the North that it is a wrong belief that killing innocent people would automatically take you to heaven where they would inherit 17 virgins. Of course it would be an uphill task for one person to handle 17 virgins

Under-development is obvious in the North. The activities of Boko Haram will not bring development to the North. The people complaining of under-development are the same people causing subsequent under-development through violence. 

The way the activities of Boko Haram are going at the moment, God forbid, it may lead to the break-up of this country because people will not take it for too long. Therefore, I call on the northern elders to come out quite frankly and assist in solving this problem.