Boko Haram terrorists have resorted to providing mouth-watering loans to young entrepreneurs and artisans in the North East as a way of inducing them for recruitment, the Defence Headquarters announced this evening.

Acting Director of Defence Information, Brigadier General Rabe Abubakar, identified the major targets as “butchers, traders, tailors, beauticians and other vocational entrepreneurs who could be easily enticed with such loan without paying attention to sundry inherent dangers associated with the acceptance of such goodies from this satanic group or unfamiliar source.”

According to Brig.-Gen. Abubakar in a statement in Abuja, “After such loans, the beneficiaries are given the option of either joining the group or risk being killed if they fail to pay the loan as at when due, whereas the payment has been surreptitiously programmed to fail by the benefactor, the Boko Haram.”

Continuing, he said: “It is pertinent to state that having been effectively decimated and degraded, the remnant or surviving splinter groups of Boko Haram are desperate to recruit more people into their ranks and files as a result of sustained onslaught against them by the troops.

“The Defence Headquarters hereby advises the general public, especially those in the North East, to constantly be weary and conscious of various tactics of the desperate Boko Haram.

“They should be guided to avoid loan or financial assistance from non-conventional source but from conventional financial institutions such as banks, organised trade unions or institutionalised savings and loans establishments.

“Acting otherwise may lead to painful and untimely death from the blood-thirsty Boko Haram terrorists.”

•Photo shows Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau making an announcement.