News Central have gathered that the Ansaru terrorist group has established another government within the Birnin Gwari Local Government Area of Kaduna State and now taxes helpless residents, a Senior Councillor of the Birnin Gwari Emirate, Zubair Abdurra’uf has said.
“There are some areas within Birnin Gwari, particularly the eastern part, whereby the Ansaru (group) administer this territory because they give directives to the citizens who are there and they decide what to be done,” he said.
He claims that a known Boko Haram terrorist group offshoot entered Birnin Gwari more than 12 years ago pretending to teach the locals about Islam before converting to terrorists who detested western education.
“Most of the schools in the area are deserted because they issued a decree that nobody should go to any school or have any form of formal education,” he said.
Abdurra’uf claimed that since the militants ousted the local chiefs and established their control, government institutions had abandoned Birnin Gwari, a wide region with tough terrain, mountainous areas, and an adjacent forest to Zamfara and neighboring states.
“At times, the locals have no option but to take some of their issues to these terrorists for adjudication because of the absence of some of the institutions of government that will normally take care of these issues,” the traditional councillor said.
“The ideological conviction of Ansaru is not different from Boko Haram because the Ansaru are a splinter group of Boko Haram and whatever you see Ansaru do is in consonance with whatever Boko Haram are doing but only that the modus operandi of the two groups differ.”
The authorities have previously raised the alarm about terrorist supremacy in Birnin-Gwari. Nasir El-Rufai, the governor of Kaduna State, claimed in May that Boko Haram and the Ansaru terrorist group were occupying the state’s Birnin-Gwari and Giwa local government districts.
The traditional councillor asserted that the Almajiri system is not to blame for the entry of terrorists into the region, but rather for a lack of coordination to prevent the spread of the “foreign ideology” of the Ansaru people.
According to Abdurra’uf, the locals now view the terrorist Ansaru group as a “messiah” who will defend them against robbers who steal their crops and rustle their cows.
“They have their cattle confiscated, their farms, they have to pay all sorts of levies to the terrorists. They pay for the harvest. For every ten bags, they give two bags to all these bandits while they take eight away.
“So, when the Ansaru offers help to these people, they take it because they don’t have the means to protect themselves. They have seen Ansaru as messiah that will eliminate these people (marauders) who capitalise on their inadequacy and lack of protection which is the primary responsibility of the government,” he said.
The threat of terrorist dominance in Birnin-Gwari has previously prompted the police to issue a warning. Kaduna State’s governor, Nasir El-Rufai, asserted in May that the Birnin-Gwari and Giwa local government districts were under the control of Boko Haram and the Ansaru terrorist organisation.
The traditional councillor argued that the lack of coordination to stop the spread of the “foreign philosophy” of the Ansaru people, not the Almajiri system, is what is to blame for the arrival of terrorists in the area.
The locals now see the terrorist Ansaru organisation as a “messiah” who will protect them from criminals who steal their crops and rustle their animals, claims Abdurra’uf.
