THE FOLLY OF THAT AMNESTY OFFER : How President Jonathan Landed Us In This Trouble ... Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah

Catholic Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah, social critic and commentator, has said that President Goodluck Jonathan erred in the planned amnesty for the dreaded Boko Haram sect.

He said, “The first point to make is that the argument has not been properly framed and we are frankly in a state of confusion arising from the fact that we ought not to have heard about amnesty from the President now. The President should not have made a statement either for or against amnesty because the President is the Supreme Court."

Bishop Kukah who spoke exclusively with Daily Sun in Abuja, said the refusal of former President Olusegun Obasanjo to implement the report of the Justice Chukwudifu Oputa panel, led to what is today known as Boko Haram. He lambasted Obasanjo, saying his government was reckless.

He said Jonathan’s involvement of the military in resolving the crisis and at the same time discussing amnesty is an admittance of incompetence. “So, this conversation needed to have taken place with a lot of other things being debated before proposals and propositions are made to the President in terms of how to deal with Boko Haram,” he said.

Below is a brief excerpt of Bishop Kukah’s position on the controversial issue of amnesty..

Why are you in support of amnesty for the Islamist sect, Boko Haram? People are surprised that you are packaging the idea of the Federal Government.I don’t know what you mean by support of amnesty and I am not sure I know what you are quoting. So, if you could please explain what you mean by I am in support of amnesty.

In your Easter message, you spoke about the need for the offer of amnesty to the sect, which the Sultan of Sokoto had earlier propagated. In your speech in Benin, you also spoke about “rising above the level of these miscreants.”When you said I support amnesty, yes, I support amnesty whether it is amnesty to Boko Haram or amnesty to whatever as a means of addressing the questions that are on the table. Whether that necessarily means Boko Haram, in whatever shape or form, I made the point. 

The Sultan talked about granting amnesty. That statement itself was made in a vacuum. You cannot grant amnesty unless somebody requests for amnesty. So, we have started the conversation. We have placed the cart before the horse. And that is why we are in this confusion. And if you know Nigeria, we are going to shout and shout and shout until we foam in the mouth and everybody will go home. This is how we debated the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). This is how we debated Sharia and for 40 years now, we have never come to any conclusion. We just shout, something else happens in Nigeria and we continue, only to revisit the same thing again.

The first point to make is that the argument has not been properly framed and we are frankly in a state of confusion arising from the fact that we ought not to have heard about amnesty from the President now. The President should not have made a statement either for or against amnesty because the President is the Supreme Court. If the Chief Justice of Nigeria proffers an opinion in a case that is in a lower court, where will you go to again? So, this conversation needed to have taken place with a lot of other things being debated before proposals and propositions are made to the President in terms of how to deal with Boko Haram. If amnesty is one of them, then, that is fine.

So, President Goodluck Jonathan erred right from the beginning?
I have told you what I am saying that if you are involved in a war, there has to be a strategy either for entry or for exit. If you feel that you want to go out on an all-out war against Boko Haram, then you go out on an all-out war.... 

The point I am making is, these people who are in office now, whether they are ministers, or commissioners, or governors, or president; they came and begged us to vote for them that they will fix our problems. Boko Haram matter is an issue you are going to resolve by diplomacy, negotiations, consensus, trade up and so on and so forth. The military does not have the capacity to do that and the firepower that has intensified, has created a backlash. The people are telling you we are losing more people from the Joint Military Task Force (JTF) than Boko Haram. The military cannot become an army of occupation in Nigeria. So, we didn’t vote the military in. They are not the ones we voted for. 

And if the political class shows this gross incompetence, what they are doing is seducing the military gradually because this is how we played around with the soldiers. I am sorry if the guys who are in politics now don’t know the history of Nigeria. This is how we played with the military in 1966 before we ended up in a long drawn out civil war...

How do you think the issue of amnesty will address the security challenge?
If I had my way, I will tell you lets stop talking about amnesty because truly, we don’t know what it is because what the President is doing now, is what probably should have been done many months back.

How do you see the resurgence of MEND [and their latest threats]?
As long as we remain static as we are, so long will you continue to see this kind of situation. Today it’s Niger Delta, tomorrow it’s Boko Haram, next tomorrow, who knows what?