Boko Haram: European Countries Support Us Than The Arabs – Governor Zulum

Borno State Governor Babagana Umara Zulum says European countries are more supportive of his state than the Arabians in the face of attacks by jihadist groups.

Zulum made the remarks on Tuesday while receiving Palestinian Ambassador Saleh Fheied Saleh in Maiduguri, the state capital.

“I am a practical person. I work with the realities I see on ground. In the face of our challenges over the years, we have received humanitarian support from the UK and other parts of Europe, the United States, Canada, from Japan and a host of others who have demonstrated concern and have made efforts to support our traumatised citizens in many ways especially on food, medicals and livelihoods,” he said.

“However, that level of concern never came from Arab countries with whom millions of Borno people share similarity in religion and culture.

“We even have indigenous Shuwa Arabs in Borno and this shows how our histories are tied. We have made severe efforts, written and visited embassies of Arab countries, especially those that are rich and not dealing with crises, but obviously majority of the Arabs do not care about our situation, neither do they support us. The Arabs have not shown concern to us.”

Governor Zulum also described the ambassador’s visit as “encouraging” and thanked him.

For his part, Ambassador Saleh Fheied stated that there are natives of Borno State in Palestine, including Fatima Barnawi, a former minister and senior police officer.

“There are a lot of Palestinian companies in Nigeria, they are willing to work with Borno state government, we are ready to cooperate with you, we are ready to help in anything you want us to do that we can do,”  the ambassador said.

Boko Haram has killed more than 36,000 people in northeastern Nigeria and caused massive property damage in more than 10 years.