The Defence Headquarters (DHQ) of the Nigerian Army has confirmed that no fewer than 800 repentant Boko Haram fighters who surrendered to the Nigerian military, are currently undergoing rehabilitation and deradicalisation as part of efforts to reintegrate them into society.
Chief of Defence Training and Operations, Emeka Onumajuru, who disclosed this in an interview with Channels Television on Monday, explained that out of a total number of 129,000 Boko Haram fighters and their families who were either arrested or voluntarily surrendered to the military, about 800 selected individuals are undergoing rehabilitation, stating that many of those in custody remain in Kainji, while a special court reviews their cases.
Onumajuru further stated that those found guilty are currently facing legal consequences, whereas others deemed suitable for rehabilitation undergo deradicalisation, a process that lasts approximately one year.
Onumajuru insisted that the one-year programme is sufficient to reintegrate ex-terrorists into society as the initiative is managed by trained professionals.
He also clarified that not all 129,000 surrendered individuals are part of the programme, as only those vetted through legal processes are admitted.
“To get the numbers right, right now, we have about 129,000 surrendered Boko Haram members and their families,” he said.
“We are a professional army and when you are in combat and an opponent surrenders, then you take him and let the legal processes take its natural course.
“Right now, some of them are in detention facilities, some of them are in Kainji, and there is a special court that goes through all of them. Those that were found culpable face the books and those that are going to be deradicalised go through the process and this takes about a year.
“It’s possible because the deradicalisation is done by professionals. That one-year period is sufficient enough depending on the people handling the deradicalisation,” he said.
“The number taken in is not huge. As I said, we have 129,000 BH members and families. It doesn’t mean the 129,000 are going through the programme.
”The people going through the programme right now are about 800 — in batches. Those 800 are people that have been sieved through the entire legal process before they are now brought to the centre.
“The deradicalisation carried out by the Operation Safe Corridor is part of the non-kinetic. You cannot win an asymmetrical war with just a kinetic approach,” Onumajuru stated.