The Nigeria Armed Forces has cried out against an un-named prominent political leader in the North that is planning to cast its men and officers fighiting members of the deadly Boko Haram in parts of the North in bad light.
In a statement today, the spokesman of the military, Major General Chris Olukolade said the aim of the faceless political leader who he called “apologist of terror group” is to “cast the Nigerian military and security forces in bad light.”
He said that the Defence Headquarters has been alerted of a plot by some interest groups to embark on a renewed campaign aimed at attracting international condemnation and indictment of the Nigerian military and its operations in the Northern part of the country.
“The campaign, which is to rely heavily on doctored and falsified audio visual materials, some of which are already trending in the social media, is to be coordinated and funded by a prominent political leader whose state is presently under the State of Emergency.
“The details of the plan which is already being fine-tuned by a group of media practitioners, is to be presented for the final ratification and funding by the political figure. The design is expected to forcefully whip up sentiments of genocide allegedly targeted against a particular religious group.
“The planners of this multi-media crusade also hope to use it to gain some mileage in the drive to secure international attention as they have not achieved this sufficiently despite previous efforts.”
General Olukolade said that the programme is also meant to reinforce the ongoing media campaign against the military which he said, has been adopted as an alternative by those who are bent on politicizing the ongoing counter terrorists operations in the northern part of the country.
He recalled that a newspaper, apparently testing the waters, last week published some of the doctored pictures which the Defence Headquarters instantly repudiated, pointing out that they do not represent activities or operations of the Nigerian military.
“This Headquarters wishes to reiterate its rejection of pictures and video footages from unverifiable sources claiming to reflect activities or so- called atrocities purportedly perpetrated by Nigerian security forces.
“They do not reflect or depict the true state of affairs or operations of Nigerian military or any of the security forces.” The armed forces spokesman asked members of the public to watch out and not allow themselves to be hoodwinked by these acts of what he called “infamy” orchestrated by this desperate group.
He made it clear that the dastardly acts of terrorism would remain against all Nigerians and all peace loving people all over the world, stressing that no amount of propaganda by apologists of terror group can justify the evil acts of terrorism.
[myad]
Even though the later is doctored, there are mountain of evidences that previous operations and, still some current operations of Nigerian military are bias and meant to exterminate certain set of religious group.
You all must be noted that, no war against terror all over the world that is bases on supporting certain group that will yield fruitful result. Until the Nigerian forces set aside their sentiment, corrupt tendencies and forthfully fight this deadly group, they will continue to face causalities and receive an international condemnation.