Outgoing Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has rejected
international forces from the United Nations to help fight Boko Haram in
northern Nigeria, Agence France-Presse
reported.
Jonathan said Thursday that the West African nation instead
needs help rehabilitating its people and reconstructing its communities
worst affected by the Islamist insurgency.
Jonathan, who lost re-election to Muhammadu Buhari
last month, said the Nigerian army with support from Chad, Niger and
Cameroon has recaptured most of the territory seized by Boko Haram
militants in the northeast, including the group’s stronghold of Gwoza in
Borno state. Jonathan said one last Boko Haram stronghold remains in
Sambisa Forest, which he said the Nigerian military is preparing to
retake.
Some believe the Nigerian schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram from
Chibok last year are being held in the forest. Experts have said the
girls and young women were most likely killed when the militants fled Gwoza before the Nigerian army’s advance.
Boko Haram launched its Islamist insurgency in northern Nigeria six
years ago. Some 1.5 million people have been displaced due to the
violence and over 13,000 have been killed, the United Nations refugee
agency said. Earlier this year, the terror group began extending its
attacks into the neighboring countries of Chad, Niger and Cameroon. In
January, the African Union authorized the deployment of 7,500 troops
from the three West African nations and Nigeria to fight Boko Haram.
Jonathan made the remarks Thursday after meeting with U.N. officials.
Mohammed Ibn Chambas, special representative and head of the United
Nations Office for West Africa (UNOWA), praised Jonathan for his
“exemplary leadership” during and after the general elections in the
West African country, a Nigerian newspaper
reported. “We are hoping that other African countries who are holding
elections this year will learn from the good example of Nigeria,”
Chambas said Thursday.
Jonathan and his ruling Peoples Democratic Party
(PDP) lost the presidency and legislative majority to the main
opposition party, the All Progressives Congress, in the 2015 general
elections. Jonathan was widely criticized
for acting too slowly in response to the Boko Haram insurgency and the
kidnapping of the Chibok schoolgirls. The PDP, which has dominated
Nigeria for 16 years, has long been accused of corruption and ballot
rigging.
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