Boko Haram employs 5,000 Nigerian Christians to bomb churches; pays them over four times the N18,000 minimum wage – report claims
By Rotimi Akinola
The failure of the Nigerian government to provide adequate jobs for its citizens is leading many of them into joining terrorist Boko Haram, a recent report claims.
No less than 5,000 Christians now hold allegiance to the Islamic extremists, some Nigerian researchers who recently met in Paris have alleged.
“There are plenty of Christians who are part of Boko Haram because it’s a job,” Radio France quoted the unnamed researchers as saying.
“It’s almost certainly bound to be about 5,000 but some people put the numbers up way higher.”
They were also quoted as saying Boko Haram has become a profitable job in a country where the majority of the young is unemployed.
“It’s quite a good job, at one point you could be paid $400 (about N80,000) a month for just simply joining them,” they allegedly said in a report detailing their meeting.
Many employed Nigerians cannot earn that amount in four months because the minimum wage is set at N18,000 a month.
“You wouldn’t have to go fighting. You would spend your first months doing logistics or training. It’s quite profitable joining Boko Haram because you not only loot places, but you share the loot out at the end.”
The “revelation” would shock many in a country where it is widely believed that Boko Haram is composed of only “Muslims.”
Some are saying the report, if true, could give clue to how the sect is converting members of other religions to its own version of “Islam” which has been condemned by many prominent Muslims.
They also say the report could hold the clue to how Boko Haram successfully carry out church bombings.
Boko Haram terrorists have killed over 15,000 people in Nigeria since 2009. The sect, which reportedly recruits jobless and illiterate Nigerians, aims to turn the country into an Islamic Caliphate.
World leaders have told President Muhammadu Buhari it would take more than guns to overcome the insurgents.
Widespread economic growth, proper education to ward off terrorist ideology, and dialogue, could hold the key to stopping the “bokoharamites” of the future, some say.
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