By Oghenekevwe Laba, Lagos
A day after the United State (US) authorities declared Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Jama’atu Ahl as-Sunnah il-Da’awati wal-Jihad, better known as Boko Haram a wanted man and with the placing of $7 million ansom to be given away to anyone who can provide information leading to his arrest, Inspector General of Police, Mr. Mohammed Abubakar has appealed to Nigerians who has information on the where about of the dreaded terrorist leader to divulge it.
Making the appeal while responding to question from a journalist shortly after commissioning newly completed and renovated hospital s and cottage clinic at the Ikeja Police College, Ikeja, Lagos, yesterday, Abubakar assured that anyone who had information leading to the arrest of the dreaded terrorist leader would receive seven million Dollars as promised by the US authorities.
Hear him, “That is expected. We will do all our best. It is a terrorist organization. US have placed a ransom on him. It is left for you the people to give in information for him to be arrested. It will be a good thing for the world. Not only for Nigeria. If you have the information, the money is waiting for you.”
It would be recalled that the US authorities have declared Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Boko Haram, a wanted man. They placed a $7 million ransom to be given away to anyone who can provide information leading to his arrest. Analysts say the placement of large sum of money as bounty by the United States government reflects a new dimension to US government involvement to hunt down Mr. Shekau and his close aides, and of Shekau’s connections.
The US seems confident it can narrow the corridors of safety for Shekau, as many international bounty hunters can activate their networks in other to collect the bounty.
The fear of some Nigerians spoke to Urhobotoday was that anyone who took the risk of releasing information leading to the arrest of Shekau may not live to enjoy the ransom as he may be killed by members of the terrorist group.
Their fear is that information about informants who divulged secret of criminals are released to the criminals who would later turn around to hunt the informants. One of them made reference to informant in the case of a notorious armed robber Lawrence Anini in Benin City, capital of former Bendel State in the early eighties. He said the informant who divulged the whereabout of the criminal collected N10, 000 ransoms which was huge money in those days but did not live to enjoy the money as he was later found dead in his apartment few weeks later.