DREADED Islamist group, Boko Haram, has issued a three-day ultimatum to Christians in the North to leave the zone.

The group’s spokesman, Abul Qaqa, who has spoken in the past on behalf of the group blamed for scores of attacks, said he was giving southerners living in the North a three-day ultimatum to leave.

“We find it pertinent to state that soldiers will only kill innocent Muslims in the local government areas where the state of emergency was declared,” he told journalists in a phone conference late on Sunday.

“We would confront them squarely to protect our brothers.”

Speaking in Hausa language, Qaqa said “we also wish to call on our fellow Muslims to come back to the North because we have evidence that they would be attacked.

“We are also giving a three-day ultimatum to the southerners living in the northern part of Nigeria to move away.”

But reacting to the Boko Haram threat, the National Security Adviser (NSA), General Andrew Azazi, said that there was no cause for alarm as security forces were up to the threat. “I can assure you, the security forces are up to it,” he said on Monday.

The Boko Haram sect is believed to include different factions with varying aims. Its structure remains unclear and other people have claimed to speak on its behalf.

Nigeria’s 160 million population is roughly divided between a mainly Muslim North and predominantly Christian South.

Muslims have been victims of Boko Haram attacks, but a wave of Christmas Day bombings, particularly targeting churches set off fears of retaliation from Christians.

President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency on Saturday in parts of four states hard hit by violence blamed on the Boko Haram sect.

The declaration came in response to scores of attacks attributed to Boko Haram, particularly the bombings on Christmas Day that killed 49 people, most of them in a gruesome blast at a Catholic church as services were ending.

Qaqa also criticised Jonathan over his visit to a Catholic church outside Abuja on Saturday. The church was the site of the bloodiest Christmas Day attack, with an explosion killing many people.

“The president had never visited any of the theatres where Muslims were massacred,” he said, naming areas where scores of Muslims were killed in post-election riots in April.

While Boko Haram has been carrying out increasingly deadly attacks for months, including an August suicide bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Abuja that left 25 dead, the Christmas violence sparked intense fear and outrage.

It also led to warnings from Christian leaders that they would defend themselves if such attacks continued, raising deep concern.

While declaring the state of emergency, Jonathan acknowledged that the attacks “have threatened our collective security and shaken the foundations of our corporate existence as a nation.”

It was declared in parts of the states of Borno, where Boko Haram traditionally has its base, Niger, Plateau and Yobe states.

In the North-eastern city of Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State, residents reported increased patrols on Monday. Soldiers had been entering homes in search of weapons and bombs, they said.

After the searches, soldiers told residents to report any unusual behaviour or abandoned vehicles which may contain planted bombs.

‘Niger Delta won’t retaliate Boko Haram attack’

Meanwhile, the Niger Delta militia will not retaliate the incessant bombing of churches and its people who live in the northern part of the country by the Boko Haram sect.

The Special Adviser to President Jonathan on Niger Delta, Mr Kingsley Kuku, said this while responding to the recent attack on a mosque in Sapele, Delta State, on Monday.

He said that in spite of the very provocative antics of the Boko Haram sect, the Niger Delta would not record any form of reprisal attacks on northern or Islamic targets.

According to him, the recent bold security measures taken by President Jonathan will, in the coming days, curb, totally, the activities of the sect.

Kuku, who was speaking with correspondents in Lagos, insisted that the reported attack on a mosque in Sapele was an isolated case and should not be seen as a reprisal attack.

“The president has said it all; what Boko Haram is doing is pure terrorism. What the sect is doing has nothing to do with Islam, neither can anyone say the sect is propagating a northern agenda. It is terrorism, pure and simple. The wicked activities of Boko Haram are affecting both Christians and Muslims. The bombs they have been throwing have been killing northerners and southerners,” the presidential adviser said.

He stated that the Niger Delta region of the country did not have any reasons whatsoever to attack northern or Muslim targets, adding, “beyond the declaration of a state of emergency on certain parts of states in the North, where the Boko Haram sect is very active, I am very much aware of other unprecedented security measures that have been put in place by His Excellency, President Goodluck Jonathan. Based on what I know as a presidential adviser, I can confidently tell Nigerians that the days of Boko Haram are numbered.”

He said that the successful management of the Presidential Amnesty Programme had restored relative peace in the Niger Delta, promising that the gains attained in the zone so far would be seriously consolidated in the new year.

Kuku said that in the New Year, the Federal Government would doggedly pursue infrastructural development in the Niger Delta. “Yes, the amnesty programme has brought peace to the Niger Delta; it is, however, time to utilise the conducive atmosphere in the region to tackle infrastructural decay, environmental degradation, pollution and gas flaring in the zone. We must now prevent those situations in the Niger Delta that bred agitation and militancy in the first place. That is the focus of the Federal Government now.”

Kuku disclosed that the Presidential Amnesty Office in the New Year would send a minimum of 12,000 transformed Niger Delta ex-agitators to either schools or vocational training centres within the country or abroad.

“The 2012 budget of the Amnesty Programme targets the reintegration of at least 12,000 ex-agitators. I am determined to pursue and possibly exceed this target. In the New Year, we shall search out even more creative ways to consolidate peace, safety and security in the Niger Delta,” Kuku said.

Comments (7)

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Caution
written by Mz_spicycandy, January 03, 2012

Whatever they say we all need to take caution. Never underestimate the threat of a terrorist cos they have nothing to lose

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...
written by Ugwu Godwin , January 03, 2012

I wonder what this country wants to turn it. Anyway, I wish to thank Mr president for his solitary effort for I know how is it when the destiny of a country over 150million lie one man's shoulder............ My advice to you is that you should try and carry out your plans as planned for this is only a threat........

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more effort govt
written by harunakoni, January 03, 2012

goverment need 2 put in more effort in other 2 avert the problem of boko haram.

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BOKO HARAM: THREAT IS CHILDISH
written by Dr Chinedu Franklin, January 03, 2012

It's a pity that some group would decide to destroy innocent lives and property with faulty claims and unreasonable threats.
May i inform the perpatrators that most Nigerians chose to be law abiding and patriotic. This does not mean that they cannot combat ugly situations such as the one you pose.
In real sense you are just a minor group to handle but for want of forgiveness you have graces to re-think and repent from your heinous act, else the fight that confronts you soonest you shall regret. Till morrow the defunct Biafra have mechineries to combat thier interest but chose the path of peace for NATIONAL INTEREST.
I advise you to stop your threats, be law abiding, think well and stop killing innocent beautiful creatures of God, you can't create human
Desist from your wickedness against christians and persons who chose to be one Nigeria. I advise you to invent your own equipments stop patronizing western materials because they influence you indirectly.
YOUR THREAT IS CHILDISH!

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The Truth
written by RexdRealist, January 03, 2012

That the Notherners are ready to stand on their own as a country does not need to be deliberated because the activities of Boko Haram has indicated the decision.

It is not ordinary that their leaders, power-brokers and Emires and Sultans could not forstall the mayhem, their silence is an act of the script.

Niger Delta turbulence happened because their leaders were (not sure if no more) cheats thereby loosing their integrity among the people of the communities so, the Nother leaders that protects their integrity still holds their own on the region but are refusing to put an end to the massacre because they innitiated it.

Though the Yoruba leaders are fast loosing their integrity among the youths with their imposition of candidates on the political masses, their value for peace is holding them back from reaction but for how long, no one could say.

If any of the regions wants "an out" from the nation, the truth is she should approach it maturely and her wish should be respectd by the remaining regions.

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Mr
written by Owolabi Samsom Sunday, January 03, 2012

The question is, “What exactly do the masses usually benefit from the government?“ ...education is life-demanding, electricity is constantly epileptic, 95% of our major and minor roads are channels of untimely death, unemployment increases per second, insecurity of lives and properties is highly unbearable, access to good water is always denied, the mortality rates of children and adults are unimaginably high, health-care services are mere paper-works, transportation is completely a private business and the host of others. I think the only thing the masses have an adequate access to is ‘the fuel‘ which has now been totally deregulated... Where are we heading towards for God‘s sake?

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The Monster you created
written by JM, January 04, 2012

The monster the Northern Politicians created is now out of control and hence,cannot be checked.Let the Boko Haram and sponsors note that we the Christians also knows how to Kill.But the fact that we have respect for human lives shouldn't be mistook for cowardice.
If you kill any of us again,we shall retaliate by killing yours too.
You animals have proved to us,that whenever a Christian is president of this country,he will never have rest of mind.We have seen it during the erra of Obansanjo with your Political Sharia propaganda.Today is Jonathan and you people came up with Boko Haram/Sharia.
Well,bring it on.

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