A former Navy Commodore, Kunle Olawunmi, has said that Boko Haram terrorists had earlier mentioned current governors, senators and Aso Rock officials as sponsors during interrogation.
He lamented that President Muhammadu Buhari has demonstrated unwillingness to go after the high-profile politicians for reasons best known to him.
Olawunmi spoke on Wednesday when he appeared on a television programme.
Reacting to the attack by bandits on the Nigerian Defence Academy, where two military officers were killed and another kidnapped, he said the incident is an “aberration”.
“It is an aberration; you don’t attack the Nigerian Defence Academy and get away with it,” he lamented, adding that the NDA, like other military environments in the country, carelessly opens its doors to everyone on Friday for Jumat prayer.
Olawunmi said terrorists and criminals profile military environments during Muslim prayers on Fridays.
He said, “In 2017, I carried out an investigation by the minister of defence that wanted me to check what was going on with the training and the security there (NDA). I remember I spent about a week in the NDA with the commandant and the staff but something struck me: every Friday, the gate of NDA is thrown open and everybody has access to pray in the mosque.
“On Fridays, you are going to see same thing happening across all military formations in the country…If you go to Defence Headquarters, I served at the Defence Headquarters as the Deputy Director, Defence Administration between 2015 and 2017, throughout my two years at the Defence Headquarters, I received visitors twice because of the strict security architecture there but every Friday, the gate of the Defence Headquarters is thrown wide open for everybody to come in and observe Jumat.
“That is the time the terrorists have the time to profile our security environment. It has always been the case. I have served the military intelligence for the past 35 years. Our problem is religion and socio-cultural.”
Olawunmi, a Professor of Global Security Studies, added that he was a member of the Intelligence Brief at the Defence Headquarters during the leadership of the then Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Abayomi Olonisakin (retd.), and warned that sponsors should be apprehended to stop the spread of insurgents.
He added that, “Recently, 400 people were gathered as sponsors of Boko Haram, why is it that the Buhari government has refused to try them? Why can’t this government bring them to trial if not that they are partisan and part of the charade that is going on?
“You remember this Boko Haram issue started in 2012 and I was in the military intelligence at that time. We arrested those people. My organisation actually conducted interrogation and they (suspects) mentioned names. I can’t come on air and start mentioning names of people that are presently in government that I know that the boys that we arrested mentioned. Some of them are governors now, some of them are in the Senate, some of them are in Aso Rock.
“Why should a government decide to cause this kind of embarrassment and insecurity to the sense of what happened yesterday (Tuesday at the NDA)?” he queried, adding that terrorist financiers want to turn Nigeria to the Taliban type of country.
Olawunmi also said that the Department of State Services has tremendous information on terrorists but they can’t do anything except the body language of the Commander-In-Chief says so.
He, however, expressed hope that the next Nigerian President in 2023 might have the willpower to bring the high-profile sponsors of Boko Haram to book.
