By Dipo Olowookere
Leader of Boko Haram, Mr Abubakar Shekau, has dismissed claims by both the Nigerian government and the military that the last stronghold of the terrorists group, Sambisa Forest in Borno State, has been takeover.
In a new video, the factional leader of the group maintained that his members were still in Sambisa, stressing that the government was not being truthful to the world.
“We are safe. We have not been flushed out of anywhere. And tactics and strategies cannot reveal our location except if Allah wills by his decree,” Mr Shekau said.
Speaking further in the 25-minute video and flanked by his armed fighters, Mr Shekau told President Muhammadu Buhari “not be telling lies to the people,” asking that, “If you indeed crushed us, how can you see me like this? How many times have you killed us in your bogus death?”
“Our aim is to establish an Islamic Caliphate and we have our own Caliphate, we are not part of Nigeria,” the Boko Haram leader said in the video he claimed was shot on Christmas Day.
It would be recalled that on Christmas Eve, the Nigerian government claimed it had defeated and driven away the extremist group from the forest.
The military later said it would convert the forest to a training group.
Shekau last appeared in a video in September 2016, when he dismissed claims by the Nigerian military that he had been wounded in a gun battle.
