Seized Bauchi Women, Children Return

Police Take Stock Of Victims

THE military offensive against members of the extremist Boko Haram Islamic group claimed more casualties yesterday.

A suspected sponsor of the sect, Mohammed Yusuf-led sect, Alhaji Buji Foi, was given summary execution in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital by the police.

His execution took place at the state police command headquarters in Maiduguri.

Foi's death came 24 hours after Yusuf was killed in action.

The state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Christopher Dega, confirmed the death of Yusuf, during a gun battle with joint military/police team on Thursday.

He said quite a number of policemen were killed during the four-day battle with the Yusufiyya sect members in Maiduguri.

Curiously, Foi was a Commissioner for Religious Affairs during the first term of Governor Ali Modu Sheriff. Before then, he had served twice as Chairman of Kaga Local Council, among other top public offices in the state.

Foi, said to be a wealthy man, was arrested yesterday morning in his farm by the operatives of the Operation Flush 11 led by its commander, Col. Ben Ohanatu, where he allegedly camped women suspected to be wives of the sect's members. The former commissioner allegedly used his connection in the state to provide shelter for the fundamentalists.

Before his execution at about 7a.m. yesterday, Foi was driven on the back of a police patrol van to the Government House by Ohanatu with his hands tied to the back. The troops had planned to show him to the governor but when Ohanatu discovered that Sheriff was not in the office, he headed for the headquarters of the Nigeria Police and handed him over. He was, thereafter, executed.

Sources closed to the outfit said the former commissioner engaged the members of the Operation Flush in a gun battle for a long time, using a double barrel gun, which he allegedly acquired when he was a council chief.

Briefing reporters on the circumstances that led to the death of Yusuf and suspected areas the fanatics were still hiding in the state, Dega said the sect leader died in a "crisis situation."

According to him, during a confrontation with the troops, Yusuf sustained injuries.

Dega said: "The sect leader did not survive the injuries he sustained at the battle field, after he was picked up. He died Thursday afternoon."

On the number of policemen that died in the crisis, he said: "There are a lot of casualties, but we are not releasing the figures now, until we are able to compile a comprehensive list of policemen and sect members that died in the four-day battle in Maiduguri."

Even though the police are on top of the Maiduguri crisis, he said "not all of them (sect members) have fled; there are still pockets of areas where they are living among the people."

Dega said Yusuf had prepared to launch a war against the state government considering the quantum of arms and ammunition found in his house that the military shelled.

He said: "After the shelling, we recovered guns, locally made bombs, explosives and knives in the arms dump." He added that the police were still recovering more weapons and ammunitions.

The police boss confirmed that the bodies of sect members killed by the military would be given mass burial.

Also yesterday, the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Chief Marshal Paul Dike and the Acting Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Ogbonnaya Onovo, visited Maiduguri to assess the situation in the state.

The security chiefs visited the enclave of the slain sect leader.

At the Government House where he was received by Sheriff, Dike wondered why an individual would want to hold the nation to ransom because of his religious beliefs. He said he was in the state to reassure the government and people of Borno State that the security agents would do everything to prevent such incident in the future.

Sheriff thanked President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua and the heads of security agencies for their support. He said the group's followers were not true adherents of Islam because the religion abhors violence.

Meanwhile, Indigenes of Bauchi State mostly women and children, who were taken to Borno by the sect, arrived in the state capital yesterday. They were handed over to the state police commissioner at the Force Headquarters in Bauchi.

They were rescued from the group by the joint military and police team. Most of the children, who were taken with their mothers to Maiduguri, were below the age of 10.

Some of the women, who spoke to reporters said_ they were only in Maiduguri for nine days with the consent of their husbands, who were members of the sect, said that before they left Bauchi, they were told that their mission was to have a deep knowledge of Islam, the Holy Qur'an and other books of the religion but that they were later dumped in a house with nobody to cater for them.__

The leader of the women, who simply gave her name as Salamatu said: "We went to Maiduguri for deeper Islamic knowledge, and for the period that we were there, we were taught nothing but pure religious issues which have now made us better Moslems. What we did is not against any law and we will remain committed to the sect."__

Asked what she wants from the government for herself and colleagues, she said: "All we want is to be re-united with our families so that we can continue with our faith. My children will not go to formal school because it is against our faith."_

Sixty-year-old Mama Hauwa was taken to Maiduguri against her volition by her son. "I had to go with them because I would have been left alone in the house and starved to death but I did not participate in the teachings as we were only kept in a secluded house in Maiduguri where nobody came to see us for nine days until last Wednesday when the Police came and took us away."__

The Deputy Commissioner of Police, M.A. Indabawa said the command would continue with its investigations to get the women's husbands so that their militia activities would be curtailed.