$7M BOUNTY ON SHEKAU STILL VALID – US OFFICIALS

Indications have emerged that the $7 million reward offered by the United States (US) for information leading to the location of the leader of the outlawed Boko Haram sect, Abubakar Shekau, who was declared dead by the Joint Task Force (JTF), almost 10 months ago may still be subsisting, the New Telegraph can reveal.
Investigations revealed that the US position on the reward was premised on the fact that it cannot readily confirm the true status of Shekau on whose head the federal government also placed a N50 million bounty.
Controversies had continued to trail the circumstances surrounding the death of the sect’s leader, whose activities have claimed more than 700 people this year alone, and nearly 500,000 displaced from their homes.
Worse hit in the renewed attacks were women, children and schools which have been closed severally after a series of massacres and school burnings. In August 2013, the JTF had issued a statement where it claimed Shekau may have died of gunshot wounds he received in an encounter with JTF troops at the Sambisa Forest on June 30, 2013.
The then spokesman for the JTF in Maiduguri, Borno State, Lt. Col. Sagir Musa, had in the statement, said Shekau was mortally wounded in the encounter and was sneaked into Amitchide, a border community in Cameroun, for treatment from which he never recovered. He said the sect’s leader might have died between July 25 and August 3, 2013.
But in response to an email inquiry on why the US Rewards for Justice (RFJ) has yet to revise its $7 million pledge for anyone with information that leads to Shekau’s capture, the Information Officer of the US Embassy in Abuja, Ms. Rhonda Ferguson-Augustus, said: “Although we cannot confirm Shekau’s status at this time, the RFJ reward offer remains valid.information leading to his identification or location may be eligible for a reward of up to $7 million. “In addition, Rewards for Justice may pay rewards for information that helps identify or locate any leader of Boko Haram or Ansaru, even if they are not currently advertised on the programme’s Most Wanted List at www. rewardsforjustice.net.” The information officer also stated that the rewards may also be paid for information that helps prevent a terrorist attack in the country.
The RFJ website, which referred to him in the present tense, stated that Shakau, under whose leadership, the operational capabilities of Boko Haram had grown, had expressed solidarity with al-Qaida and threatened the US and its interests.
The website reads: “On May 1, 2012, less than one week after the group bombed a Nigerian newspaper building in Abuja, Boko Haram issued a video statement threatening more attacks on local and international news outlets, including the Voice of America and Sahara Reporters, a New York-based media service. On June 21, 2012, the U.S. Department of State designated Shekau a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under Executive Order 13224.”
To further underscore US position on this, a former US Ambassador to Nigeria, Terrence McCulley, before his departure from Nigeria in August 2013, said the US had no plans to investigate the claims of the killing of Shekau even though the $7 million bounty was placed in June, 2013.
In February 2014, “Shekau” again featured in a 28-minute video where he claimed responsibility for the murder of Zaria-based Islamic cleric, Sheikh Auwal Albani, and threatened mayhem on oil installations in the Niger Delta, and across Nigeria.
These claims have however been doubted. A few days after the JTF statement, a video featuring a man claiming to be Shekau was released, where he claimed responsibility for the attacks on two military camps in Mallam Fatori area of Borno State. The JTF debunked the claims, saying it was dramatised by an impostor to “hoodwink the sect members to continue their acts of terrorism and to deceive undiscerning minds.
Source: New Telegraph