‘They listed me for elimination as Boko Haram member’ – Gumi alleges

Northern Islamic cleric, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi, has alleged that he was covertly warned by security sources in Abuja that his name had been included on a list of individuals marked for elimination and linked to the Boko Haram terrorist group.

Gumi made the claim while addressing members of his congregation, stating that he received an early-morning phone call from a source he chose not to identify.

According to him, the caller said his name had come up during a high-level security meeting in the nation’s capital.

“They called me from Abuja, that there was a security meeting,” Gumi said. “They said I have been marked; that I will be eliminated. And who are Boko Haram?”

The cleric further claimed that the caller told him his name was among those allegedly selected for assassination.

“Even American, they said they came to fight terrorists, so who are the terrorists? They are the ones.”

He also alleged that Nigeria’s worsening insecurity and growing social divisions were fueled by falsehoods, destruction and policies he attributed to United States President Donald Trump. According to Gumi, Nigerian leaders and clerics failed to speak out as the country drifted deeper into crisis.

The cleric argued that Nigeria became increasingly fragmented due to what he described as foreign-backed funding and narratives that oppressed citizens and falsely portrayed Christians as the sole victims of insecurity.

According to him, such portrayals were designed to inflame divisions and push communities into suspicion of one another, while those expected to provide leadership remained silent.

“Because of lies, you brought violence, but where are the leaders, what did they do?” Gumi asked. “What about the scholars? Where are they? Everyone has gone to hide in their corners.”

Gumi said no sovereign nation would tolerate foreign interference intended to divide its population along religious or social lines.

“Which country would agree to bring something in just to divide its people? There is no country that would accept that,” he said. “It would say either you bring all of us together, or you hold us and hand us over to them.”

He accused political and religious elites of abandoning constructive dialogue, leaving Nigerians with what he described as “noise” instead of solutions, even as hardship, oppression and denial of rights intensified.

“You brought us hardship, you broke us. You oppressed us, you denied us our rights,” the cleric said, lamenting what he described as the labeling of parts of the country along religious lines.

Gumi warned that fear, silence and deepening divisions were pushing Nigeria further into crisis, adding that continued inaction by leaders and clerics would worsen the situation.

“This is the kind of situation we are in,” he said. “It is dragging the country down.”

(SAHARA REPORTERS)