Buratai: How Military Worked with NFIU to Compile, Submit List of Terrorism Financiers

•Says usable intelligence critical to ending insurgency

•Denies misappropriating funds meant for arms purchase

Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

A former Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai (rtd), yesterday said that despite not being the primary responsibility of the military to go after terrorism financiers, during his time as army chief, he worked closely with the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU), leading to the compilation submission of a list.

Buratai, who was the topmost army officer under ex-President Muhammadu Buhari, spoke on Arise Television, while taking questions on his stewardship under the last administration.

The former army chief who underscored the role of intelligence in fighting terrorism also denied misappropriating monies meant for buying arms, stating that there were clear procurement rules which were never breached.

Buratai maintained that under his watch, the military made significant strides in tracking insurgents, their logistics networks, arms couriers, and financial backers, noting that before he took over in 2015, Boko Haram had already carved a large expanse of land for itself in parts of the north.

“When you talk of terrorist financial support or terrorist funding,  this is where we have different establishments or different sectors of security who really need to coordinate. You don’t expect the soldier who is in the field to start going about hunting for terrorist financiers locally or even internationally.

“That’s why we have the NFIU, which during my time we really coordinated very well with. And just before I left, a task force was established in order to track and get those financiers. And although that aspect is not strictly a military responsibility, it involved a task force that will get to the root of the matter.

“So in that respect, also we did very well and a compilation was made by the NFIU on the terrorist financiers and that is left to the appropriate authority or agency to handle them,” Buratai added.

Buratai also stated that it is not strictly the job of the military to begin to seek out who and which community is paying taxes to insurgents, noting that it is for such reasons that sister security agencies like the police exist.

“But you see, just like what I read sometimes, that the military is not capable of stopping the bandits from collecting tax from the people. That is not, strictly speaking, a military responsibility.

“That’s why the civil intelligence organisations, the police, and the local authority have a very important role to play, because you cannot wear uniform and carry arms and be identifying somebody who is collecting tax or who is not collecting tax. So it applies to the financial support that is given to the terrorists.

“It’s a complex network and it’s a global issue which even involves the ISIS in the Maghreb as well as other parts of the world that support them. So this is something that is not tactical, it’s not operational, also it’s not a military operation.

“ It’s more or less a civil responsibility. This is where you have the division of labour, responsibility, collaboration with all the elements of government who are in charge of intelligence, in charge of financial crime and so on and so forth,”he argued.

Besides, the former army chief highlighted the successes achieved under his leadership and the challenges that persist, explaining that the problems were not insurmountable.

He further disputed claims that insurgency worsened during his tenure as army chief, stating that the military successfully reclaimed vast territories once controlled by Boko Haram.

“Boko Haram had already carved out their territories. Those that know the northeast very well, they had already identified and blocked all access to the northeastern part of the country, especially parts of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe.

“They had already defined their territory before 2015 when we came in. There was roughly 120,000 square kilometres of area that Boko Haram had defined as their territory and we have reclaimed all those things. Not to talk of how many local governments that were under the Boko Haram control. So many local governments were under the Boko Haram terrorist organisation,” he stressed.

Buratai also expressed confidence in the military he left behind, noting that they are well-trained, highly professional officers who took over, not only at the strategic level of the army headquarters, but also across the formations and units of the Nigerian army.

He said that insinuations that some $1 billion meant for arms under him was stolen was baseless. “The federal government came out and clearly dispelled that falsehood and made it clear that these funds were used for military procurement.

“And those procurements were mainly paid either directly from government-to-government or sent to the Ministry of Defence for procurement. The Army, Navy or Air Force never had even a single dollar to make procurement from those funds,” he added.