 Yslamic cleric Sheikh Ahmad Gumi has urged the government not to take the threat by the kidnappers of students at Greenfield University Kaduna likely. He said the Central Bank of Nigeria should pay the 100 million Naira ransom being demanded by the kidnappers of the students. Apparants of one of the abductees had lamented that the bandits were still insisting on their demands and threatening to kill the students. But really what should the government do in this situation because both choices have dire consequences? Well joining us to have this conversation is Obadiah Meilafia. He is a former CBN Deputy Director. Thank you very much for joining us sir. Thank you so very much for having me. Great nation, good people. Great. Sheikh Gumi we all know is a very controversial person and he keeps coming up in the news. You know he's always having something to say when it comes to this issue of banditry and for a lot of people they've been calling for his head on the chopping board. And some other people are still wondering why he's walking free and making these comments that one would actually frown at. But he has at some point one of the parents had come out to say look we were told to pay a certain amount of money so our child could be released to us. And Sheikh Gumi pointed us in that direction so that child has been released. So really can we still say that Sheikh Gumi is not working in the interest of the people? This tragedy is not about Sheikh Gumi. This tragedy is about the lives of our very precious young people, the hope of our future. Before we pontificate, let us for a moment place ourselves in the shoes of those young people. This is the rainy season for several weeks. They are staying in the forest. They have no home. They are lying outside. Come rain, come shine. Cold, heat, mosquitoes. Come thunder, come storms. With guns pointed at their heads, would press for their lives to be snuffed off at any moment. As you know five of their colleagues have already been killed. One was buried on Saturday. I saw the television broadcast of the funeral. The parents and the family are heartbroken. So before we pontificate about other people who to me are very marginal, their life is not worth a fraction of the lives of these young people. So I'm not even interested in Sheikh Gumi. I'm not at all interested in him because he has a very dubious record himself. He has to explain to people the circumstances in which he was allegedly kicked out of Saudi Arabia. And during a meeting with some of the kidnappers, he actually said allegedly, he was quoted as saying that it is Christian soldiers who have been doing most of the killings. I mean, this is astonishing. And I don't see looking through his glazed eyes. I don't see any milk of compassion for these people. Instead, what has been dished out to us is threats that we must do to satisfy the kidnappers. Obviously to him, the kidnappers are more important than the people kidnapped. So I'm not at all interested in a person like Sheikh Gumi. He doesn't interest me at all. I know that you're not interested, but I want to push you farther a little bit. Now, these students are caught in between a Sheikh Gumi and a Governor El Rufai. The governor on one hand is saying he will not pay any form of ransom as even if his son were to be taken, he would pray for the soul of his son. But then there's also a Gumi on the other side, like you have said, who is saying better pay up or else you're going to risk losing more lives. So we also know that in this country, we frown at paying ransom. So you're caught in between the devil and the deep blue sea. If you pay this ransom, you're somewhat funding terrorism. And if you do not pay, you are also risking the lives of children who are supposedly the future of this country. So in this situation, what do the parents of these children do? Who do they turn to because the governor or the government of the state is saying they're not going to be a part of this. And then there's a Sheikh Gumi who's there saying, well, we're ready to help you if you bring the money. And the amounts of monies that we're talking about here are not meager. So what do these parents do? You know, I said we should put ourselves in the place of those young people. We should also put ourselves in the place of the parents. It is a harrowing tragedy. You said we are caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. No, we are actually caught between three devils, all of them principalities of the kingdom of darkness. The government of Kaduna State, Sheikh Gumi and the federal government. The primary duty of government is to secure the lives and properties of its citizens. Any government that fails in that material ontology has completely reneged on its social contract with the people. This thing is more than what we are seeing. It is part of a war being waged on the Nigerian people. And we have to have an approach. And we have to have a solution. Standing here or sitting here, I can never say never to dialogue. So we should keep the door open for dialogue. But let me tell you, if it were people like me that are in charge of affairs of this country, these people have never said anything yet. We should just borrow a leaf from Vladimir Putin of Russia. For many years Russia was under an avalanche of kidnapping. It was a notorious thing. Putin took a position that he and the government of Russia will never negotiate or pay ransom to any terrorists. And we keep calling them bandits and bandits. I'm afraid that the media is in collusion in a way without due respect. You can't be calling killers and murderers bandits. You are being very nice to them. And I know that the embassy has forced a lot of media houses never to use the word terrorists. That actually makes you part of the problem. They are not bandits. The bandit is your admiral in Igeggy and all these motorbikes that wants to fleece you and snatch your food and sees your pick your pocket and things like that. These are bandits. But people with AK-47 military-grade weapons, rocket launchers, who have been kidnapping, raping and killing people on a staggering scale. And you still call them bandits. They are not bandits. So anyway Vladimir Putin never negotiated with them for once. If there was any incident of kidnapping, he would try a military solution. You can be sure of that. That he will never negotiate. He will find a way to settle that score. But here in Nigeria, I'm sorry to speak over you sir. With his bullet in Lebanon, when the kidnapped Russian diplomats, he left them. I was told they went around, found out all their families and worked at all of them. Vladimir Putin would say, well, you've already taken prisoners, if you like, kill them, but I'm going to kill all your people. But that's a government that has great intel. I'm sorry to talk over you once again. That's a government that has really good intel and they're working with that intel. Do not forget, might I remind you, our soldiers were unable to find these bandits, wherever they were. But then there was a Sheikh Gumi who could go to the same bandits, negotiate with them, come to us and tell us what the bandits want. So yes, we can applaud the Russian army. And I'm not in any way saying that our army is incapable. But then it looks like a military solution is not really solving anything for us because we have the military who have told us that they at some point had fought Boko Haram and won them technically. But here we are. We have banditry on one side. We have Boko Haram on one side. A military solution at this point, I'm not sure. Is it something that we can really say that can work? Well, I know you have an editorial line, but I don't feel we are talking about the same people. You are talking about bandits. I don't know them as bandits. They are not. Whatever we want to call them, terrorists. They are terrorists. Well, yes, terrorists. And well, like I said, I don't feel any compassion coming out of Sheikh Gumi, whoever you call him. But I just says that he's there as an agent or as a go-between in a game that they are playing. Again, you say, well, Russia has intel. That is very true. But if a government doesn't have intel to save the lives of its citizens, then I think it has no business being called a government. Another approach is the Italian approach. What the Italians did in the 70s and 80s, they had various serious kidnapping programs, including the kidnapping of a former Prime Minister Aldo Morro. It was pathetic. It was very sad. They were asking for so much. In the end, when it was not paid, they are asking to write a letter to his wife, his final testament to his wife. You can't read that with that repeat. It's so moving. That was just a student in those days, and it was so moving, so sad. But what the Italian government decided to do was to enact a law that made it criminal to pay even one dime to a kidnapper. If I once, they hear that somebody's family member has been kidnapped, in Italy, they ordered the banks to freeze the whole accounts of those family members so that they don't even have the choice of saying they can pay anything. In fact, it is the victims' accounts they will freeze first, and there will be absolutely no negotiation. Within a short period, kidnapping completely fizzled out in Italy. I think the Italian solution, together with the Russian solution, and the Israelis are also experts. They have special forces well trained with intelligence capabilities to identify no matter how remotely where these people are and to pound the daylights out of them. Now, always there will be collateral damage. But you see, once you do it, once and for all, you send a signal that you are your responsible government and that you take the duty of protecting your citizens very seriously. But when we do this, we're doing it at the expense of lives because like you mentioned while we were having this conversation, people have died. These terrorists are sending a message. And you know the average Nigerian would be worried and would want to even start a GoFundMe to make sure that their child is taken out of custody. But how many more people have to die for this to even work in the first place? I mean, passing a law is another process in itself while people are still in custody. So, really, is this a solution that is going to really cost us a lot and how many parents really want to stand by and watch their children wasted in the hands of terrorists? And I'm not in any way saying that it's okay to negotiate with these terrorists, but I'm saying at what expense? If the government decides to go with what you're... That solution cannot be on television. Then it will not work. But I have a solution. Trust me. I have a solution, but it cannot be on television. Because if it is announced on television, it will not work. Let me just simply tell you that if a government put its foot down, stop calling these people bandits, call them the terrorists that they actually are, the devils that they really are, you go on to them face-on-face, you confront them, you pound them militarily and you make sure that once and for all, you decimate them. If you do that, it will work. And it will send a message to the whole world that, yes, we have a government that takes a stand in defence of its people. We don't know what this thing has done to our country. It has destroyed the moral legitimacy of our government. It has destroyed the very foundation of our democracy. It is a humanitarian disaster. It's a terrible and great evil that does serious damage to the very moral soul of our nation. This is really what we need to understand. And I don't think this government understands that. Well, you're just taking me right to my next question because I'm curious as to... A lot of people have come up with very interesting ideas. Some, like you, claim that they have solutions to the problem. And, of course, yesterday, the former Senate president wrote an open letter to Mr. President and he made a lot of recommendations. How come these ideas have not been put forth to the government, especially, I mean, charity begins at home, from the states all the way before we get to Mr. President? And if they have been put across to them, why has the government not taken these ideas or opinion into consideration? Because it seems like arms are being folded and we're just watching bodies drop. Even though, if you were listening to my first conversation, one of my guests was saying that we have blown this situation out of proportion. It's not as bad as we make it seem that it's just the media and the opposition that's making it look bad. This man needs to go to the hospital and have his brain examined by a psychiatrist. It's an insult to the people being who are victims now. It's an insult to their parents. There's nothing like an exaggeration here. We are facing a monstrous evil of the order of Adolf Hitler. This is what is happening in this country. Every single child taken, it hurts me deeply and personally because I just remember how some of them grew up. It was a peaceful Nigeria. It was a safe Nigeria. It was a happy Nigeria. Think of yourself as a parent. You send your children to school and then they wake you up at night and tell you that the child is living in the forest with some kidnappers. You don't know what would be for that child. The trauma of it, the pain of it, it is unspeakable. Thank you very much for speaking with us. Unfortunately, we have to go now. Mr Obedair Melafia is a former deputy governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. We appreciate you for your thoughts. Let our thoughts and prayers be with these young people. All right. Thank you so much. We'll take a short break now and when I come back, I'll give you my take. That should pay. That should do anything. That should bring the children back. It's not a matter of ransom. Anyhow they know that we should collect the children back. Let them do it because if they are the children, they will do anything to collect the children back. If I am to say, as in for my own opinion, government should not pay that much because if they do, I don't have one which will come out. For me, what have we said? As in I ask the government to put us into the matter of security because if they say no to security, this kind of thing will not happen. In my own opinion, I don't like it. But they have been paying. They have been paying to release all that kidnappers. So I don't think this one will be an exception now. They should also pay as well so that they can set the children free. Well, apparently I believe there are better methods to handle situations like this. And personally, I have great concern for the life of those people, those kids who have been taking ransom. But if the government have to omit the obligation so that the lives are secured and are well-threatened, then I think 100 million eras compared to what some of the senators currently earn in the house should be a token and a chicken change. Government should not pay because if government should pay that money now, I understand we come up tomorrow. Then we say that they have some sort of thing. They want to fight for that. They are fighting for this thing. So government should not pay. Government should find a way. It's their right to find a way and release those children, students. Here's my take. The sincerity of Pervos in Nigeria is the way forward. Sincerity is key in addressing all of these issues that are cropping up from all regions. Now until our leaders, security agencies and even us, the people, start telling ourselves the truth, we may never achieve anything. We have held on to and peddled so many lies over the years that now we're in a difficult situation and still we cannot tell ourselves the truth. Now only when we accept our truth as a people shall we begin to heal and chart a new way forward. And when I say us, I mean you, me, our leaders, all of us have to embrace our truth and then the answers to our problems will come to us. I am Mary Annacol. Thank you for being part of the conversation. Jof, a good evening.