How I Would Have Handled Boko Haram - Obasanjo

[Briggz5d]

FORMER president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, on Tuesday said if the Boko Haram insurgence had erupted during his term in office, he would have ended the serial killings by adopting what he described as "carrot and stick" approach as he did with the Niger Delta militants.

Obasanjo, spoke on Tuesday in a special Hausa programme of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), which was monitored in Maiduguri, Borno State, the home base of the radical Islamic sect.

He said: "What I will do to bring an end to the serial killings and bombings in the northern states, was the adaptation of the carrot and stick approach on the Niger Delta militants, where I invited 35 different leaders of the militants from the region and listened to all their grievances against the Federal Government and their traditional leaders, whom they alleged had been conniving with the latter."

According to Obasanjo, the carrot would include addressing "poverty and unemployment" in the North, while the stick could be in the form of dialogue and "massive intelligence gathering" by the security agents to root out perpetrators of the alleged serial killings and bombings.