The federal government said the Kaduna-based Islamic cleric, Ahmad Gumi has been invited for questioning over his comments on the activities of terrorists in the country.
Minister of Information and Orientation, Mohammed Idris, disclosed this while addressing journalists at the State House, in Abuja on Monday.
Recall that the controversial cleric faulted the Federal Government for the continued use of force or kinetic means to secure the release of victims of kidnapping.
He further added that the government’s use of force has now turned the terrorists into monsters.
Gumi said the government ought to go closer to the terrorists and study them and to provide them with better living conditions.
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In his words, “These bandits are getting more vicious. Before they were not doing this. They are heading to softer targets and we can only attribute this to the kinetic approach.
“Now we are fighting bandits. They are anonymous. You cannot fight someone you don’t even know. We said let’s go in, let us know them, let’s map them out – know who they are and where they belong. All this intelligence information is virtually not there.
“The high-handed approach to the matter is what is making it worse. Now they are kidnapping children and threatening death, which they were not doing before. So, I think what to do is really go back to the drawing board and be truly non-kinetic.”
“You need a programme just like the Niger Delta, a programme which will bring them out of their forests, educating them, giving them healthcare, giving them peaceful life. This is how you entice people to abandon violence and militancy.
“But when you continue dropping bombs, they will find no sympathy and empathy for our children. This is it. An eye for an eye. This is what is happening. So, we have to change our tactics, we have to change our styles.”
