Former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu Sheriff who is alleged to have provided Boko Haram with seed financing has had a strategic meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan on how to combat the menace of Northern insurgent groups.
Dr. Sheriff speaking with State House Correspondents after the meeting confirmed that he had decamped from the All Progressives Congress to join the People’s Democratic Party. He also stated that he would do everything in his power to help the government stop Boko Haram.
Sheriff said, “By the grace of God and the people of Borno, I was elected twice, which is the maximum limit allowed by the constitution.
“I was elected into the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria three times, which means in every aspect of life, I am one of the stakeholders of Nigeria.
“If God and the people of Nigeria have put me in those positions at every time, my interest should be how to move the nation forward,” Sherrif said.
He noted that “At every time, my decisions would be informed by the interest of the nation first, and my thinking now of moving to the PDP is also in the interest of the nation.”
“I didn’t come to discuss PDP with the President. Yes, there is this matter that I am joining the PDP, but that is not what brought me to the President now.
“Jonathan is the President of Nigeria, the President of over 140 million Nigerians and he is the father of everybody. So, every Nigerian has a right, if the President permits, to come and see him, discuss matters that are either private or something that affects the nation.
“So, my coming to see the President was a purely personal visit.”
Speaking on the Boko Haram issue, Sheriff said it was due to the peculiarity of Borno State and the porous borders the State had with Chad, Niger and Cameroon.
“What you have to understand is that Nigeria is a big country and Borno is different from any other state in the country.
“Borno has the biggest border to Chad, to Niger, to Cameroon and it is open borders. It is not like the Republic of Benin that has only one entry point with Nigeria.
“In Borno, you can enter and leave through 20 different points to the country” Sheriff said.
“I am not a security man, what a civilian can do is only to contribute.
“My being a Chief Executive of the state for eight years, what I have seen through my tenure, I will contribute to the security agencies through whom I got that information.
“Therefore, it needs the understanding of the terrain, every knowledge that every politician has, particularly any politician that operated in Borno, that’s all we can contribute.
“Our knowledge of the state and whatever we feel we should give as advice is critical to the success of this battle on the side of Government.”