Borno State Attorney-General and Commissioner of
Justice, Kaka Shehu Lawan, has listed 40 ways former
Governor Ali Modu Sheriff allegedly aided and
abetted Boko Haram violence.

Lawan said he was a discussant in a paper delivered
by Prof Mohammed Tabiu of the Bayero University,
Kano, titled: “Strengthening the Justice Sector:
Implications and Challenges of National Security And
Economic Growth”.
In his contributions, he accused Sheriff engaging in
acts of impunity that led to the festering of the sect
while he was governor from 2003 to 2011.
Reacting, Sheriff reportedly asked Lawan to publish
facts in support of his connection to Boko Haram.
Lawan, in statement, listed the “40 facts”, which he
said were ether unknown to many or were simply
ignored or suppressed.

He said in 2008, Borno under Sheriff established a
special joint police and military anti-robbery squad
called Operation Flush, with the commander
reporting directly to the governor rather than the
Commander of the 21 Armoured Brigade in
Maiduguri.
According to Lawan, on June 11, 2009, a detachment
of Operation Flush intercepted a group of Boko
Haram members then known Yan Yusufiyya who
were on a funeral procession and sought to know
why they rode on motorcycles without wearing crash
helmets.


“An armed member of the Operation Flush eventually
opened fire on 17 members of the Boko Haram sect
with some of them sustaining fatal shots and were
admitted at the University of Maiduguri Teaching
Hospital,” he said.
He said the state government disregarded the
incident and did not condemn it, with the sect’s
leader Malam Muhammad Yusuf threatening a
reprisal attack in a newpaper interview.
“A day or so after the interview, Yusuf delivered a
sermon in Hausa language, titled, Open letter to
President Umaru Musa Yar’adua’ and directed his
followers to go and arm themselves in preparation of
self defense and eventful Jihad in response to the
shooting of his 17 followers.
“Even while Muhammad Yusuf issued this directive
and threat for Jihad, Governor Ali Modu Sheriff still
disregarded the possible room to make peace with
the sect,” Lawan said.
According to him, on July 21, 2009, nine members of
the sect were arrested for possessing 74 empty
bomb shells and materials for improvised explosive
devices, which they said was in preparation to defend
themselves against Sheriff’s operation flush.
He said a counter-insurgency operation was
launched by the Federal Government, with soldiers
deployed to Maiduguri, targeting Yusuf’s enclave
which is the sect’s headquarters.
“After the sect was dislodged, Sheriff invited
traditional ward heads and ordered them to point at
houses belonging to fleeing sect members with most
of the houses brought down,” Lawan said.
According to him, Boko Haram attacks did not
preceded Sheriff’s administration.
He said: “Shortly after winning the 2003 elections, Ali
Modu Sheriff created the Ministry of Religious Affairs
under a pioneer Commissioner, Buji Foi with who
was later found to be one of the financiers of the sect
under Yusuf. However, Sheriff didn’t introduce
Sharia.
“Whereas Sheriff has always claimed that the
violence of Boko Haram preceded his administration,
what is a fact in October, 2003, part of the Boko
Haram members, then known as Taliban, broke away
from Muhammad Yusuf claiming that they could no
longer live in a place that wasn’t being governed by
Sharia law and this was some months after Sheriff
took oath of office on May 29, 2003.
“The breakaway faction called themselves ‘Taliban’
led by someone nicknamed Mullah Umar. They set
up a base outside Kanamma, a village in Yobe state,
located on the border between Nigeria and Niger
Republic.
They nicknamed their new base ‘Afghanistan’. They
declared the new base a sovereign State under Sharia
law.
“On 5th of July, 2011, former Governor Ali Modu
Sheriff tendered an apology to the Boko Haram sect
‘for whatever he might have done wrong to them’.
Why did he apologise if he knew he did nothing
wrong to the sect,” Lawan asked.