Jonathan as guilty as Shekau, say truck drivers

Nigerian truck drivers who have been caught in the frontlines of Boko Haram insurgency believe that President Goodluck Jonathan is as guilty as the Boko Haram sect.

Most of the drivers who survived a journey through Boko Haram territory shared their experiences with BBC, indicting the president of complicity in the group’s attack, and calling him the “chairman of the sect”.

“We are all concerned about the situation; we have all lost relative. Wives and children are kidnapped and houses have been burnt,” says Atiku Abubakar, one of the truck drivers.

“Ten of my colleagues who ply this route have been killed in the last three weeks. The militants stopped them and cut off their heads with an electric chainsaw and burned the trucks.

Speaking in Hausa, Abubakar and his colleagues described their ordeal transporting diesel, kerosene and Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) from Lagos to Maiduguri.

They explained that it takes them two and a half days when a tanker is empty and four-and-a-half days when full, adding that the pothole-ridden roads are enough danger for them, not to add the life threat that the militants constitute.

Kullima Ali, who has worked as a motor boy for four years, explained how he lost two of his brothers in a Boko Haram attack.

“They stole some food, killed my two brothers and burned our house in Maiduguri in January 2013,” the 18-year-old said.

“There’s only my mother and my sister now.”

Trap Bukar, another driver, said he was in the town of Bama when it was captured by Boko Haram in September 2014.

“It started early in the morning. Suddenly they came. There was shooting, in my presence, I saw four people go down; the soldiers fled,” he said.

The drivers were critical of Jonathan’s leadership and handling of insurgency.

“President Jonathan is just as guilty as those Boko Haram killers because he has chopped off all the money to repair the roads,” said Abubakar.