President Paul Biya of Cameroon
Strong indications have emerged that
Nigeria’s neighbour, Cameroon, is not cooperating with the country in
the efforts to stop the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria and its
borders.
Investigations on Friday revealed that
the Cameroonian government had issued a directive to all its military
commanders in charge of border areas with Nigeria to keep all critical
information about Boko Haram away from Nigeria.
In the directive which was obtained by
our correspondent, Cameroon’s Minister of Territorial Administration and
Decentralisation, Mr. Rene Emmanuel Sadi, reportedly told the
commanders to withhold crucial information about the insurgents from
Nigeria.
Sadi, had in the letter with Decree no
…G/D/MINATD, with the title, ‘Strong Message’ addressed to the
Commander, Rapid Intervention Brigade, noted that Cameroon did not want
the grave security situation in Nigeria to spill over to the country.
He stated also that information on Nigeria from western countries portrayed Nigeria in a negative manner.
He charged the Cameroonian forces to be
vigilant along the border to prevent further spill over of Boko
Haram
violence into the country.
The minister said the Cameroonian Head
of State, Mr. Paul Biya, had charged all the units to ensure that
activities of the insurgents were not allowed to get into the country.
The letter read, “As you are aware of
the security situation in the country, and the impending turmoil/danger
coming from our neighbour, Nigeria, you must keep all important
information regarding the Islamic sect under your control without
sharing all the information with Nigerians.
“We do not want the situation from our neighbouring country to spill over to our country.
“Information from our Western friends portrays Nigeria negatively.”
A security source further told SUNDAY PUNCH
on Friday that only 200 soldiers had been deployed in the areas where
the Francophone country said it had deployed 1,000 soldiers to secure
its own side of the border.
Further investigations revealed that the
Chief of Defence Staff of Cameroun had relocated to the North of the
country to keep critical intelligence away from Nigeria.
When contacted, the Director, Public
Communication department, Ministry of Foreign affairs, Ahmedu
Ogbole-Ode, said he was not aware of that Cameroon was not cooperating
with Nigeria in the campaign against terrorism, adding that he did not
know that Cameroon had ordered its security personnel not to work with
the country.
He said, “I am not aware of the content
of the letter, in fact, I’m hearing it from you for the first time. I
cannot comment on the level of cooperation between Cameroon and Nigeria
unless I get the necessary information from our mission in Yaounde.”
The Cameroonian Mission in Nigeria could not be reached for comments on Friday as calls to the office was not responded to.
When our correspondent contacted the
Director of Defence Information, Maj. Gen Chris Olukolade, he said the
Nigerian military was willing to collaborate with all bodies willing to
aid the fight against insurgency in the North-East.
He said, “The Nigerian military is
disposed to cooperate with anyone who is an ally in the fight against
terrorism within the country, the sub region and anywhere.”
Source: Punch
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