An emergency meeting of African Heads of government was held yesterday at N'Djamena, the Chadian Capital, with a motion to renewing strategies in the fight against the Boko Haram insurgents that have troubled the region.
In attendance at the consultation wereNigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari;President Idriss Deby of Chad; President Mahamadou Issoufou of Niger Republic; and Prime Minister of Cameroon, Philemon Yang, who represented President Paul Biya.
President Buhari took the lead of convening the one-day consultation with the head of governments of the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) which he is the chairman, comprising of Cameroun, Chad, and Niger Republics in an effort to tame the resurgence of the Boko Haram activities in the region.
In a joint communiqué issued at the end of the meeting, the Heads of State and Governments resolved to re-strategize their methods of operations, pool resources more, and renew assault tactics on all forms of terrorism and criminal activities, until peace is restored to the region.
Presidential Spokesperson, Femi Adesina, in a statement revealed President Buhari rallied his colleagues from Chad, Niger Republic, and the Republic of Cameroon to a fresh assault against the insurgency, particularly the Boko Haram elements.
He added "Times like these demand quick interventions and actions. As you are aware and have witnessed in recent times, there are new developments of security concern in our sub-region.
The president revealed “We must not cave in. The group’s renewed strategy of increasingly manning the general area as well as its recent deployment of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for surveillance activities have proved to be critical factors in the resurgence of attacks in the region”.
“We are committed to ensuring that the ethics of restoring peace, steadiness, and capability of the Lake Chad Region,back to its glorious state, for which some of you have paid the ultimate price is attained,”
President Buhari further stated that: “There is no gainsaying that upsurge in the crisis is the ripples of poverty and the continued shrinkage of the Lake Chad, which have exposed the populace of the region vulnerable to terrorist activities. Attention is drawn to the Lake and its resources, which have always been the source of livelihood for the millions of people that live within and around the basin.”
He challenged the Presidents and Heads of Governments in attendance to pull resources to ensure the actualization efforts to recharge the Lake, through Inter-Basin Water Transfer, from the Congo Basin.
President Buhari reiterated that if painstakingly pursued, the project “has the capacity to unlock the economic potentials and provide solutions to the myriad of interrelated challenges confronting the region.