Buhari Promises Defeat Of Boko Haram, This Year

President Muhammadu Buhari has said that Boko Haram will be defeated hopeful by end of this year.
Buhari spoke in Cotonou at the weekend during a gala lunch held in his honour by the President of Benin Republic, Boni Yayi.
He expressed optimism that the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF) launched in Cameroon last Thursday would start yielding fruits soon.
While commending the gesture by Yayi, Buhari said, “and I assure you that we will defeat Boko Haram by the end of this year”.
President Buhari, who was on a one-day official visit to Cotonou as the special guest of honour at the 55th independence anniversary of Benin Republic, was bestowed with the national honour of the Republic of Benin.
Nigeria’s president recalled that both countries have maintained peace over the years even when he was a military Head of State.
He said: “I am impressed by your concern and critical approaches by increasing your contributions to the multinational task force of the Lake Chad Commission. This is a great sacrifice on the part of the Benin Republic.
“Even in my first coming into office under a different arrangement, we have learnt to live in peace with our neighbours. Within the week I was sworn in, I went to Niger and Chad. I was supposed to go to Cameroon but I was summoned by the G7 leaders to brief them about the security situation in Nigeria concerning Boko Haram which declared allegiance to ISIS which gives it international dimension”.
Meanwhile, President of Benin Republic, Thomas Boni Yayi, has announced that he will send 800 troops to join a new multinational task force charged with extirpating Boko Haram militants after meeting with his Nigerian counterpart, President Muhammadu Buhari, at the weekend.
Buhari, who was sworn in on May 29, is facing a particularly deadly surge of Islamist violence at home, with more than 800 people killed in the North East in the last two months.
The violence has spread to neighbours neighbouring Chad and Cameroon, both of whom have faced an unprecedented wave of suicide bombings on their soil in recent weeks.
Boni Yayi told reporters after a meeting with Buhari that Benin will show “solidarity” with its “brothers in arms” in the region by sending “a contingent of 800 men… to permanently combat these outlaws”, and described Benin as the 37th State of Nigeria.
Troops for the new multinational force, which includes soldiers from Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger and Chad as well as Benin, were set to be deployed at any time, according to its Commander, Major General Iliya Abbah at the weekend.
The force, made up of 8,700 troops and headquartered in Chad, is expected to help with better coordination of the regional offensive launched in February, which has made a series of successful inroads against Boko Haram but has failed to neutralise the militants.
The extremist group, whose name roughly translates as “Western education is forbidden”, has carried on its campaign of attacks on security forces, suicide bombings and bloody raids on villages across Nigeria’s north and eastern borders despite the military campaign against them.
It would be recalled that Boko Haram has kidnapped thousands of civilians, including women and children, with many either forced or indoctrinated into joining the extremists, rights groups say.