Former presidential aide Garba Shehu has dismissed ex-President Goodluck Jonathan’s statement that Boko Haram once nominated Muhammadu Buhari as its preferred negotiator in talks with the Federal Government.
Gatekeepers News reports that Shehu, who served as Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to the late President Buhari, responded in a post on X on Friday, describing Jonathan’s remarks as false and politically motivated.
Shehu wrote, “Boko Haram did not nominate Buhari as their mediator. To be president in 2027, Goodluck Jonathan should look for another story to tell Nigerians.”
Jonathan had earlier commented on the presentation of Scars: Nigeria’s Journey and the Boko Haram Conundrum, a book authored by former Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor (retd.), in Abuja.
He said his administration had created several committees for dialogue and, in one instance. The ex-spokesman added, “Boko Haram nominated Buhari to lead their team to negotiate with the government.”
The former president argued that such a nomination could have eased negotiations when Buhari later became president, but the insurgency persisted.
He admitted that the conflict was far more complex than it is often presented, citing the Chibok schoolgirls’ abduction in 2014 as “a scar I will die with.”
In his rebuttal, Shehu stressed that neither Boko Haram’s founder, Muhammed Yusuf, nor its later leader, Abubakar Shekau, ever considered Buhari an ally.
Shehu said, “In fact, Shekau routinely denounced and threatened Buhari, and their ideologies were in direct opposition”, recalling that Buhari narrowly escaped a bomb attack in Kaduna in 2014.
He further pointed out that the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), then led by Buhari, had swiftly denied the alleged nomination in 2012.
Shehu cited statements by CPC officials at the time, including Buba Galadima and Rotimi Fashekun, who dismissed the claim as a political ploy by the PDP-led government to distract Nigerians from corruption scandals.
According to Shehu, such reports were deliberately circulated to tarnish Buhari’s image ahead of the 2015 elections, insisting that the former president’s commitment to defeating Boko Haram remained unwavering throughout his tenure.
