An emerging news report has linked former members of the Boko Haram insurgent group to banditry in Nigeria.

Dennis Amachree, a former assistant director in the Department of State Services (DSS), said bandits had confessed that some of them were Boko Haram fighters.

According to The Cable, he made the disclosure when he featured on an Arise TV programme on Saturday, February 27.

Amachree said:

“From investigations, we have even discovered that some of them were Boko Haram fighters,” he said.

“Some of them have confessed to having fought with Boko Haram. And now, you have these people infiltrating, collecting money for ransoms, raping women and sending them back to Boko Haram.”

He disagreed with people who are comparing bandits to militants in the Niger Delta., arguing that the two scenarios are totally different.

The ex-DSS director said:

“What happened in the Niger Delta is totally different from what we are experiencing now. In the Niger Delta, people were protesting for the pollution of their environment. And because of that, they said ‘if you are taking the oil and we are not going to benefit from it’, then they started blowing up oil installations.”

Amachree added that while leaders of militants are known, some of the bandits are foreigners who want to live on their own terms in Nigeria.