33,000 Nigerians trapped

LATEST UPDATE: 33,000 Nigerians trapped

■ Citizens forced into caves, mountains by Boko Haram, abandoned –PFN leader

FROM TIMOTHY OLANREWAJU, MAIDUGURI

From the Chairman of Pentecostal Fel­lowship of Nigeria (PFN), Borno State chapter, Bishop Mohammed Naga, came a startling rev­elation that no fewer than 33,000 Nigerians sacked from their communities by Boko Haram since June are still trapped in caves and mountains on Nigeria’s North-east border in Borno, while many are also stuck in some villages in Cameroon.

Naga who expressed his frustration on the condition of the displaced Nigerians, said he was more pained that government did not take any action to rescue the people, wondering why a govern­ment would abandon its people in a strange land for long and allow them to die in caves and hills without help. He said, perhaps, those displaced Nigerians, who, according to him, were predom­inantly Christians, had become abandoned property.

The bishop who is also the head Maiduguri-based Pentecostal Believer Covenant Church (PBCC) spoke to Sunday Sun:

“Many of our people who fled communities behind the Gwoza hills into caves and mountains are dying daily of hunger and starvation. There is no food, water or shelter for them. They are just there with their children. When Boko Haram ransacked the Mobile Police Training Camp (at Limankara, Gwoza), they carted away tear-gas canisters and they are now using them to suffocate our people in caves to death. It is so pathetic,”

Residents of communities behind the Gwoza hills, about 135 kilometers southeast of Maidu­guri, Borno capital, fled into villages in neighbouring Camer­oun Republic following coordi­nated attacks in the area by Boko Haram between December 2013 and June, 2014. There are equally others who fled from the central communities in Gamboru/Ngala in September to Fotoko, another community in Cameroun when Boko Haram raided their homes.

Checks show that these residents are made up of locals and Nigerians from different ethnic backgrounds who were engaged in livestock business and other economic activities in the commercially thriving Gamboru/ Ngala towns. Bishop Naga who hails from Gwoza says the people are bitter with the presidency over the way they are being treated.

We are bitter with Federal Government

“We the Christians in the northeast especially here in Borno are very bitter with the government. Our people are like abandoned property. It beats my imagination that government is not doing anything or saying anything about thousands of Ni­gerians in another land especially when the people are suffering. We cannot judge the government by its intention but its action and movement or utterances. It is as if Nigeria no longer want our people and the worse thing is that we don’t even know where to go. When the 1959 or so plebiscite was conducted, our people were asked where they wanted to be and we voted for Nigeria. From the northeast up to Bakassi, our people have the highest number of votes of those who want to remain with Nigeria. So is it now that the Nigerian government no longer want us? I am asking this question because of the way our people are being treated. Govern­ment cannot protect our people and there is also no efforts to res­cue those trapped. The statement from some quarters like Alhaji Mujahideen

Asari Dokubo that they don’t know we exist, that they don’t bloody care about us, that we can go anywhere quoting the Gideon Okar coup of 1990 is also why our people have been asking this question.

Government politi­cized Boko Haram

“The truth is that government has politicized Boko Haram issue and the people are at the receiving end. The government has to come to the rescue of the people be­cause people don’t know where to go again. They have been trauma­tized and devastated. People are dying even of hunger here. In my area, there are well over 50 big churches, all burnt down, homes razed and farmlands destroyed.

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