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How I Met Boko Haram Leaders In Prison – Asari Dokubo Recounts As He Clocks 50

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Former Ijaw Youth Council President and leader of the Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force (NDPVF), Mujahid Dokubo-Asari known for his outlandish press statements and celebrated his 50th birthday on the first of June, 2014 and he granted an interview to Vanguard in which he among many things recounted meeting Boko Haram leaders in prison, insisting that Chibok abductions is a scam and that President Jonathan has already won the 2015 elections.

Please read excerpts from the interview below:

Let us start with your many encounters with the law and arrests. We recall you were a regular guest to the offices of security agencies.

Arrest was a regular thing. I can’t really tell. I became used to arrest. In fact, the police and SSS in Port Harcourt, maybe they advised the government, saying ‘pls, just leave this guy alone. This guy, arrest no dey do am anything’. (Laughing and speaking in pidgin English). ‘Just leave him alone. The guy enjoys getting arrested’.

Yes, that was one of the greatest undoing of Obasanjo because he thought I could be cowed. Go and look at my trial videos. There is trial like that where the judge was put in the dock. I was the one questioning the judge. It is not possible. So, the government and Obasanjo really, really, really did not understand the type of person he was dealing with. May be in Nigeria, there were no such people then. Today, we have Boko Haram. So, a new group of people has started.

Were you ever taken to any dungeon…?
(Cuts in) I was in SSS underground for 10 months and 11 days in solitary confinement.

How did you cope?
I would have run mad. Many people did. But because I had memorized parts of the Koran, instead of talking to myself, I just recited the Koran. That was what kept me alive. If I had not memorized the Koran, I would have been mad. Talking to yourself is a different thing. But this one, you are reading, edifying your soul.

So, while in prison, did you get to meet with any of the people now linked to Boko Haram?
I met with so many people, not only Boko Haram militants. Yes, I met with a lot of them: Muda Shiru, Mohammed Isam, Yusuf Hussein, Asan Yusuf, Mohammed Bello.

Who were these people?
They were leaders of the group that is now called Boko Haram. They were arrested and repatriated from Libya.

Do you know if they are still alive?
Yeah. But some of them are no longer with them. Isam is no longer with them. I don’t have their contact. But I believe that the majority of those people may have been dead because we had very close relationship when we were in prison even though we didn’t see face to face. They were in their cells and I was in mine; so we hit the wall and talked. During prayers, we prayed together by shouting.

If that is the case, don’t you get to talk to them to broker ceasefire and all that or do we have new faces now?
No, no, no. It depends on government approach. Someone in government thought it could be wished away, that it was easy. Boko Haram? ‘It will fizzle away’ and all the warning we gave them, they did not accept. They misled the government into believing that it could be wished it away. If they had taken a decisive action at that time, I don’t think that this would have reached the stage it has reached now.

You are quoted as saying that the abduction of the school girls in Chibok is a scam. Some people feel shocked by that statement coming from you even when we have seen the international community coming in…
(Cuts in) which international community? The United States of America with her allies Britain and the European Union cajoled the whole world and told us that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. At the end of the day, were there weapons of mass destruction? There was none. So the international community for whatever intent and purpose that is compelling them to do what they are doing is best known to them. But it will not be far from economic interest. How can you believe that 270 girls will be taken? How? It is not possible. If you tell us that 20 girls were taken, 30, maybe 50, fine. How will you tell us that 270 girls were writing physics exam? How? In which school? Where? Even in the most educationally advanced part of this country, can you find any school where even 20 students are writing physics? I run a school. How many of my students are writing physics? They just finished their SSCE? And this is an elitist school, we make very good results. How many people are writing physics? Who are they telling? So, if you are not into education business, somebody can cajole you and tell you a lot of stories. When they took the students, the Principal, who said she thought they were soldiers, again said she was in Maiduguri for medical treatment when they came. Her daughter too was in the school. Why didn’t they take her daughter? Why did they take other peoples daughters? The military was aware four hours before the attack; the people who sent the information that Chibok was to be attacked four hours to the military, why did they not inform the chairman of Chibok, SSS Rep, DPO or anybody in Chibok? The Chibok community leader who has been talking, why didn’t they say, ‘Please, move the girls, we are suspecting that there was going to be an attack on the school? Move these children out of the school’. Why was it only the military they told? They couldn’t reach any other person but the military? What are they telling us now? Ok, today, one of the girls said she ran and jumped over the fence. She climbed the tree and then the man was saying come down, come down o’. What sort of thing is this now? So, the girl can climb a tree faster than a man with a gun? Why didn’t you just simply shoot her and he left her and went away? And some four persons were found in their house and they said they escaped and came back? What sort of stories?

You are known as one who insists that Mr. President must come back in 2015. With the array of turbulent issues in the country, do you see that happening still?
Look, Mr. President has won o. He has won the election. Just forget about it. All of them will just fizzle out. He will win and win clear for another four years, fair and square.

Now, what if he changes his mind not to contest as he has not even declared?
He cannot do that.

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