Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, has renounced his past controversial comments on terrorist groups including Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
The minister explained that he was young when he made the radical comments, adding that he is now mature and his understanding of things have evolved.
Pantami recanted his former stance and extremist ideologies espoused years back while answering questions during his daily Ramadan lecture at Annor Mosque on Saturday.
“For 15 years, I have moved round the country while educating people about the dangers of terrorism. I have traveled to Katsina, Gombe, Borno, Kano states and Difa in Niger Republic to preach against terrorism.
“I have engaged those with Boko Haram ideologies in different places. I have been writing pamphlets in Hausa, English and Arabic. I have managed to bring back several young persons who have derailed from the right path.
“Some of the comments I made some years ago that are generating controversies now were based on my understanding of religious issues at the time, and I have changed several positions taken in the past based on new evidence and maturity.
“I was young when I made some of the comments; I was in university, some of the comments were made when I was a teenager. I started preaching when I was 13, many scholars and individuals did not understand some of international events and therefore took some positions based on their understanding, some have come to change their positions later,” Pantami said.
Pantami has come under fire over his alleged link with terrorist groups, with many Nigerians calling President Muhammadu Buhari to sack the minister.
Most Nigerians are of the opinion that Pantami, considering unvarnished extremist views held in the past, is not morally qualified to be entrusted with the ongoing National Identification Number and Subscriber Identity Module integration.
In a viral video recorded many years ago which was later confirmed by his lawyer, Michael Numa, the minister was seen engaging the late Boko Haram leader, Mohammed Yusuf, in a public debate.
Pantami, an Islamic scholar, according to Peoples Gazette, also once declared that he was always happy when infidels were massacred.
“We are all happy whenever unbelievers are being killed, but the Sharia does not allow us to kill them without a reason.” he was quoted to have said in the wake of 9/11 incident that harvested many souls in the United States of America.
He was said to have made the statement while responding to a question about Osama bin Laden’s “killing of innocent unbelievers,” Pantami said although he conceded that Bin Laden was liable to err because he was human, “I still consider him as a better Muslim than myself.”
Pantami’s comments were contained in three audio recordings of his teachings in the 2000s, when he took extreme positions in support of the brutal exploits of Al Qaeda and Taliban elements on a campaign to obliterate the West and conquer other parts of the world.
But the minister in his latest interview said his statements were misconstrued, rejecting affiliations with terror groups.
It was also unearthed an audiotape in which he engaged in a weepy defense of Boko Haram terrorists against extra-judicial killings and asked for an amnesty for them just like Niger Delta militants. “See what our fellow Muslim brothers’ blood has turned to? Even pig blood has more value than that of a fellow Muslim brother,” he was again quoted to have said.
In the aftermath of the religious crisis in Shendam in Plateau State in 2004 in which Christian militiamen murdered scores of Hausa Muslims, Pantami was livid and tearful.
In an audio of his preaching, he said the “Ahlus Sunna,” that is, people who are now called Salafists, should strike back and shun politicians and religious clerics who preached peace and restraint.
“This jihad is an obligation for every single believer, especially in Nigeria (hadhajihadfar? ‘ayn ‘ala kullmuslimwakhu?u?anfiNijiriya),” he said.
Though he didn’t mention it, Pantami, a former DG of NITDA, may have yielded to the advice of an America-based Nigerian columnist, Farooq Kperogi, who asked him to renounce his past comments as they’re unbecoming of a political office holder.
Kperogi captioned the piece, “Pantami is my friend, but he can’t be defended”
The lecturer cited the example of one Sheikh Aminu Daurawa who used to hold extremist views but later renounced them based on his better understanding of issues.
“After all, in December 2020, Sheikh Aminu Daurawa who, like Pantami, countenanced Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the early to mid-2000s, released an audiotape renouncing his past. And he isn’t a government appointee.” Kperogi wrote in his widely circulated piece on Pantami.
