Boko Haram started in Egypt, not Nigeria — Ex-Yobe gov

A former governor of Yobe State who is currently representing Yobe-East Senatorial District at the Senate, Senator Bukar Abba Ibrahim, on Saturday said the Boko Haram insurgent group was formed in Egypt decades ago contrary to the belief that it started in Nigeria around 2009.

Ibrahim told journalists in Abuja that the ideological movement, which is strictly anti-Western education, had also been in existence in the northern part of the country since the 1970s after the killing of the sect’s spiritual leader in Egypt by President Gammal Abdel Naseer.

The senator said members of the sect from Egypt first landed in Minna, the Niger State capital, before moving to Kano, Yobe and finally settled in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, between 2001 and 2002.

He, however, said the fundamentalists did not start as a full blown militant cum terrorist sect against the country.

Ibrahim explained that Boko Haram militants were different from political thugs who were used by some politicians to form the group, adding that insurgents were against democracy being western idea and by extension, politics.

He said, “The History of Boko Haram dates back to 10, 15, and even 20 years or more ago. This thing didn’t start six years ago as largely claimed. It started earlier.

“Boko Haram is a philosophy driven by warped religious ideology. It is strictly an ideology on ground in some parts of the world for quite sometimes now.

“It all started during the reign of Gammal Abdel Naseer in Egypt who died in 1970. Naseer beheaded the leader of the Boko Haram Islamic sect in Egypt in 1970.

“It was this action of Naseer that made the followers spread to other parts of Africa, especially northern and western parts of Africa, including Nigeria.

“It has nothing to do with being employed by politicians or being used as political thugs. The issue of youths’ unemployment worsened it, with unemployed youths serving as large army of recruitment for the insurgents.”

He decried the destructions caused by the insurgents, which he said would take the people and places affected up to 20 years to recover from the devastation.

The senator said 6, 600 children, whose parents were killed by the insurgents, were camped in one location alone in Yobe State, while over 200 primary schools had been burnt by the insurgents in the North-East state.

“At least, 217 displaced persons are presently staying in my house in Damaturu, among whom are 40 primary and 50 secondary school pupils that are now schooling in the town,” he added.