Onilede Titi Faith
Former Kaduna State governor, Nasir El-Rufai, has alleged that the Federal Government is paying armed bandits to dissuade them from killing Nigerians.
Speaking on Sunday during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today, El-Rufai argued that bandits should be neutralised with force rather than engaged in negotiations.
“What I will not do is pay bandits. They are paying bandits. They are empowering bandits. This is what this government has done. We have the evidence. They are paying bandits. They are empowering bandits,” the former governor said.
According to him, the policy of negotiating and compensating armed groups is a national directive driven by the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), with Kaduna State included in the arrangement. He noted, however, that some states have objected to the strategy.
El-Rufai insisted that dialogue with terrorists is counterproductive and dangerous, maintaining his long-held position that, “the only repentant bandit is a dead one.”
He said: “Let’s kill them all. Let’s wipe them. Let’s bomb them until they are reduced to nothing. And then the 5% that still want to be rehabilitated can be rehabilitated. You do not negotiate from a position of weakness. You don’t empower your enemy. You don’t give him money to go on and buy more sophisticated weapons. That’s why the security problem has not gone away. It will not go away as long as this policy continues.”
