A civil society organisation, Coalition Against Terrorism and Extremism, CATE, has demanded explanation from the United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF) over its actions towards the activities of the Boko Haram sect in Nigeria.
The group is demanding the UNICEF to urgently apologise to Nigeria following its various allegations against the Nigerian military, which it said had been confirmed to be false and targeted at escalating terror activities in the country.
UNICEF had alleged recently that the Nigerian military has raped over 20 girls in IDP Camps in Borno State.
The development forced the Nigerian Army to declare three persons working for the agency persona non-grata in the North East, Nigeria.
The three persons were: Priscillia Hoveyda, Maher Farea and Milen Kidane.
CATE, while briefing newsmen on Monday in Jos, the Plateau State capital, called on the agency to come clean on the alleged nature of support they have been offering Boko Haram, which it said it had revealed countless times before now but authorities failed to act.
Onoja Gabriel, national president of CATE, who addressed the press, urged the Nigerian Government to set up monitoring committee to keep an eye on what groups like UNICEF are doing in the country
His statement reads in full.
“Our decision to hold this event was informed that several days after these troubling reports first surfaced UNICEF has not satisfactorily cleared itself of the grievous revelations that it has joined the organizations that are working for the destruction of Nigeria.
“As a refresher, we invite you to recall how our organization, the Coalition Against Terrorism and Extremism (CATE) had risen up against groups that previously hid under the guise of being International Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) wreak havoc on our collective psyche and to compromise our lives by overt and covert support for terrorism. We alerted Nigerians in those dark days to how certain organizations always timed their reports to coincide with when the military was on the verge of dealing decisive blows against Boko Haram Terrorists. Such reports succeeded in several instances until Nigerians became wise to this devilish antic.
“For the avoidance of doubts, the strategy was to periodically release reports that threaten individual troop and commander with the prospect of keeping a date with the “International Criminal Court (ICC) for daring to fight for the security of their country. At institutional level, the reports destroy the reputation of the military services while on the national level is damages the ability of Nigeria to partner with allies thereby denying the entire country of the support needed to defeat terrorism conclusively. In the time it takes to repair the damage so done, Boko Haram terrorists would have exploited the lag to regroup, re-arm and again become deadly even when it had previously suffered defining defeats.
“Nigerians, who realized the threat posed to their existence and that of their dear fatherland, rose up to challenge this international fraud. The Coalition Against Terrorism and Extremism (CATE) was at the forefront of that struggle to liberate Nigeria from the claws of these modern-day imperialists hiding under NGOs. Let us quickly point out that we were called names for standing up to the oppressors at that time but we are encouraged by the renewed focus the military had to fight terrorism once we successfully beat the bullies out our land.
“Unfortunately, gentlemen of the press, the news we have for you today is distressing because a new entity, UNICEF has emerged as the latest replacement of all the evil contraptions that were earlier deployed in the attempt to incapacitate the Nigerian Military and strengthen terrorists. The irony of this development is sickening considering the noble role that this organization is ordinarily meant to be playing.
“We have since learnt that people working for UNICEF have in different countries and at different times usually lend themselves and the name of the organization to be deployed in undermining the countries on behalf of certain international clients and client-nations. We however do not want to conclude at this stage that UNICEF personnel behind this latest attack on Nigeria do so without the knowledge of the organization, for they would have been openly sanctioned if this were the case.
Our sense of alarm was further heightened when we learnt that this same group trickily rendered thousands of women barren in Kenya using the lifesaving vaccination programme to commit the crime. An organization that can exploit the sanctity of vaccines to do evil cannot be trusted under any condition and we do not even know what other damages they have done to vulnerable people in our population that they have worked with.
“The Coalition Against Terrorism and Extremism (CATE) therefore demand an explanation over its role in the escalated efforts to wrongly indict the Nigerian Military and government for violating the Child Protection Act by cooking up its Global Horizontal Notes (GHN) in a manner that will deny the country of international support. We demand to know why the atrocities committed by terrorists are being attributed to government. They must come clean of the nature of support they have been offering Boko Haram and at whose behest.
“We warn in the strongest terms possible that CATE has the wherewithal and network to mobilize the Nigerian civil society to force UNICEF out of the north east if they fail to offer plausible explanation. Our coalition will ensure this happens except Nigerians can be convinced that UNICEF did not commit the acts credited to it. The situation in the north east is too fragile to have questionable people playing international cowboys with our collective safety in Nigeria.
‘In view of the many instances of war entrepreneurs posing as international NGOs, we call on the Federal Government to set up monitoring committee to keep an eye on what groups like UNICEF are doing in the country. This must be backed with a periodic vetting of all NGOs in Nigeria and their operations. The time when unmerited respect makes us accept poison from international organizations is past and there is no going back to such.”
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