Afghanistan: Nigeria Must Never Deal With Taliban – Moghalu

Former presidential candidate, Kingsley Moghalu has urged the Nigerian government not to recognise or deal with Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

Naija News earlier reported that the Islamist insurgents entered the presidential palace, after taking over all the major cities in the country.

Following the development, Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani fled the country after being in power for seven years.

In a series of tweets via his Twitter handle on Monday, Moghalu asked President Muhammadu Buhari not to allow such a thing to happen in Nigeria with the reintegration of repentant terrorists.

Moghalu also urged the President never to tolerate those who harbour and express sympathy for globally recognised terrorist groups while being quick to label dissenters terrorists.

The former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) asked Nigeria to learn from Afghanistan situation as the Nigerian military fights Boko Haram and the Islamic State in West Africa Province.

He wrote: “Recent events in Afghanistan, where the fundamentalist and terrorism-incubating Taliban has taken over the country, carries important lessons for Nigeria. Religious fundamentalism is dangerous and tends to verge into terrorism as we see with BH, ISWAP etc.

“We must stop cuddling so-called “repentant” Boko Haram. Which serious country absorbs erstwhile terrorists into its armed forces? Nigeria and its @NGRPresident and @NigeriaGov must never recognise or deal with the Taliban.

“We can never be a theocracy. What has happened in Afghanistan is possible only because of its monolithic religious makeup.

“The government of a multi-religious country that is constitutionally a secular state must never tolerate some of its members harbouring and expressing sympathy for globally recognised terrorist groups, while political dissenters are very quickly branded terrorists. The other lesson from this is that the destiny of any country will ultimately be decided by its own people.

“Clearly, many Afghans are quite comfortable with the Taliban, while a minority are opposed to them. American intervention in 2004 that dislodged them from power was clearly unpopular with the locals, and Washington has decided to leave the Afghans to their fate. If Nigeria breaks down into civil war and violence, no one is coming here to save anyone. We will ALL suffer the consequences.”