By TINA TIMOTHY

US-based International Human Rights Lawyer, Emmanuel Ogebe, has called on the United States (US) State Department to re-designate Nigeria, a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) and name Boko Haram terrosist group a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO).

In December 2020, the US State Department designated Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC), finding that the government was responsible for engaging in or tolerating “systematic, ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom.”

The rather belated decision marked the first time Nigeria was placed on the State Department’s list, despite having been recommended for designation since 2009 and was also the first time a nominally secular democracy had been designated a CPC.

However, on November 15, a little less than a year after being designated a CPC, Nigeria was removed from the list.

In a press statement on Friday, November 25, 2022, commemorating the 9th anniversary of his ‘successful campaign’ to designate Boko Haram as an FTO, Ogebe wrote to the US Ambassador to Nigeria and referred to the US Embassy evacuation of its diplomats, which came about a year after Nigeria was delisted as CPC, as policy failure.

Part of the statement reads: “After the Pentecost Day massacre at St Xavier - the first in Southern Nigeria - I was so overcome that in a news interview, I called judgment on the enablers of this modern genocide https://m.theepochtimes.com/state-departments-skewed-reports-enabling-nigerian-violence-rights-advocates_4522644.html

“Four months later, the US embassy evacuated from Abuja in a totally unexpected manner which a staffer said he’d never seen in a quarter century of service.

“In my letter to the US ambassador (see below), commemorating our successful campaign to designate Boko Haram an FTO nine years ago, I say that the evacuation is a consequence of USA’s willful discounting of BH’s global jihadist aspirations and alliances. I argue that the Biden administration is reenacting the failed Obama administration denialism in refusing/rescinding Nigeria’s recognition as a CPC.”

Ogebe, referring to recent several killing of women in Northern parts of the country, added that “the worst thing in the world happening to women just got worse.” He also dedicated his update to some who risked their lives while making their voices heard, adding, “they fought a good fight…”

“This week alone, 26 women were beheaded by Boko Haram in the Northeast, over 100 villagers kidnapped in the Northwest, in addition to multiple massacres by Fulani herdsmen in North Central Nigeria. Boko Haram does not behead women except if they are security forces or aid workers. This is the highest single decapitation of women in the terror group’s history. The worst thing in the world happening to women just got worse…

“I want to thank Congressman Chris Smith and staff who worked hard and risked their lives to go to Northern Nigeria in a precursor mission to the House bill and hearing that forced the designation nine years ago - despite administration opposition.

“I appreciate all who stood with us to write our names on the right side of history. Sadly, the truth is still under siege but yet, we rise!

“In life, the misguided, whether in managing one person or national policies, will one day find the chicken has come home to roost or roast!

“I dedicate this update to US Nigeria Law Groups top legal researcher and advocate, Barrister Justin Chuwang, in Nigeria and our national liaison Pastor, John Pofi, whom we just lost in Nigeria and US respectively. While Justin assisted with our legal interventions, John assisted with extra-legal interventions and successfully secured the release of several captives from Boko Haram. “They fought a good fight…,” Ogebe stated.

In his letter to the US Ambassador, the US lawyer said: “The US embassy’s elevated terror threat warning and unprecedented mass evacuation from Abuja, highlights grave security deterioration and a serial policy failure, barely a year after the State Department removed Nigeria from the CPC list.

“A Failed bombing of a US diplomatic compound and foiled bombings of four churches nearby by Islamist terrorists were, at least, two immediate incidents that triggered the post-haste departure of your diplomats from the largest US embassy in Africa.

“Ironically, this happened almost a year after Secretary Blinken’s November 2021 visit to Abuja when he removed Nigeria’s prior designation as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) for egregious religious persecution.

“I am concerned that in addition to ignoring the plight of Nigeria’s persecuted Christians over decades, the US government apparently also glossed over attacks on Americans in Nigeria, leading inexorably to the current unfortunate situation.

“Prior to the bomb discovery incident, an American missionary was kidnapped by Muslim Fulani Herdsmen in Nigeria’s Middle Belt who said they were offered $20,000 to abduct a white person. Yet, this was neither reported in the news or in alerts to Americans in the country.

“In 2020, US Navy Seals rescued US Missionary, Philip Walton, from Nigeria (where he was taken by the Fulani group who abducted him in Niger to be resold to ISWA pursuant to the existing regional operational collaboration between the Fulani and Boko Haram jihadists.

“Ex-captive sex-slaves of ISWA confirmed to me that among their fellow hostages in the terror camps were women kidnapped in Chad and sold to Nigerian terrorists.

“The recent killing of the Alqaeda kingpin Al-Zawahiri by a U.S. drone in Afghanistan has likely increased the threat to Americans in Nigeria.

“It will be recalled that ISWA executed 11 Nigerian Christians at Christmas in 2019 to avenge America’s killing of ISIS leader al-Baghdadi

“But whereas the former US administration promptly designated Nigeria a CPC in 2020 weeks after the rescue of Phillip Walton from his Muslim Fulani abductors, the current Biden administration appears set not to rename Nigeria a CPC despite evacuating the entire US embassy from an Islamist threat!

“It is notable that American diplomats were present at both of the first suicide bombings by Boko Haram in the nation’s capital, Abuja, in 2011. Yet the State Department resisted efforts to designate Boko Haram a Foreign Terrorist Organization until November 13, 2013 when myself and victim Habila Adamu testified in the US Congress https://pjmedia.com/tatler/2015/03/18/could-boko-haram-be-hillary-clintons-biggest-scandal-n199524

“On this ninth anniversary of the belated FTO designation of Boko Haram, I urge the Biden administration to redesignate Nigeria a CPC, especially following its failure and inability to safeguard US interests from Islamist terrorists, resulting in the precipitous and unprecedented mass evacuation of the US embassy in Nigeria’s history. It is high time for the US policy position to finally align with the facts.

“The Afghanistan-style evacuation is to be taken seriously as an indicator that rather than secure the nation, the Buhari administration has brought Nigeria to the verge of Talibanization, even fleeing Nigeria for a two-week UK vacation in the height of the evacuations.

“I urge the US government to take seriously our repeated concerns about religious extremism and persecution in Nigeria that has metastasized to the point that American personnel have now become Internationally Displaced Diplomats and to reinstate Nigeria’s CPC status. Americans have, over the last dozen years, been victims of both of Nigeria’s jihadi terrorists - Boko Haram and Fulani militia - once ranked first and fourth deadliest terrorist groups globally by the USG-funded Global Terrorism Index (GTI.)

“The failure to designate and treat Boko Haram as the foreign global terror threat (FTO) that it was on time could arguably have resulted in the evacuation.

“Similarly the failure to designate the Nigerian regime as an egregious persecutor (CPC) for its underwhelming actions against extremist groups has nailed the coffin of the next misconceived policy position and potentially portend more future risk to Americans.

“Former US Ambassadors to Nigeria, John Campbell, led 20 others in a DOS letter to oppose an FTO designation of Boko Haram while Ambassador Howard Jeter joined me and hundreds of others in a White House petition to demand FTO designation. https://www.thedailybeast.com/hillarys-state-department-refused-to-brand-boko-haram-as-terrorists

Ogebe urged the US Ambassador to “be on the right side of history,” so as to protect “Nigerians and Americans alike.”

“Madame ambassador, you have an opportunity to be on the right side of history by supporting the reinstatement of the CPC designation and thus help protect all - Nigerians and Americans alike.

“You have earned plaudits for human rights in past posts. Nigeria is where you have the potential for greater impact and lasting legacy on human rights at the peak of your diplomatic career,” he added.

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