Chibok girls: Reality or scam?
-276 female students was adjudged to have been kidnapped by Boko Haram last two years
-Ekiti state governor Ayo Fayose claims Chibok girls story is a scam
Like a thief in the night, members of the dreaded Boko Haram sect clad in army uniforms and kidnapped the Chibok Girls to yet-to-be identified destination.
The country was thrown into confusion, while their parents have continued to wallow in anguish, despair, sorrow and locked up in the state of hopelessness.
For over two years now, they have remained in the oblivion as their whereabouts and state of heath equally shrouded in misery. Nigeria, indeed, the world had been thrown into the dark by this unprecedented and avoidable abduction.
There were unconfirmed reports that the captives had been married off, other international media said they are alive in Sambisa Forest as the waiting game continues.
This is the story of the hapless 276 female students at Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, North-East, Nigerian in April, 2014. The abduction evoked emotions, worries and comments from various leaders in the world.
World Leaders
President Barrack Obama of United States, the immediate past United Kingdom Prime Minister, David Cameron and Pakistan Girl-Child Right Activist, Malala Yousafzai who later visited Nigeria, were part of those who raised concerns on the need to rescue these girls.
Malala who marked her 17th birthday with some of the girls who escaped the mass abduction in Chibok, a village in the militants’ heartland of Borno state. Equally, the tragedy variously caused international rage and concern, with many countries, including USA, China, France, UK suggesting their help in the search process.
Cameron described it as “an act of pure evil,” while Obama pledged greater commitment towards the rescue of the abducted 219 Chibok Girls, saying “the US will never give up on Chibok girls.”
Though, some of the kidnapped girls escaped few months later, a large number of them are still at the mercy of their captors.
But in 2015, there was prevalence in female suicide bombers, people were worried, perhaps, the Chibok Girls were been used by the Boko Haram sect in various attacks in the troubled North-East.
The tragedy led to establishment of the #Bringbackourgirls, a Group campaigning for return of the abducted school girls which was led by Hajjia Hadija Usman until her recent appointment at the MD of the Nigerian Port Authority (NPA).
Politics of abduction
NAIJ.com recall that the incident struck in 2014, at a time when the political atmosphere in Nigeria was heated up over 2015 elections as former President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan’s incumbent was under threat.
More so, the abduction took place in Borno, a non-PDP state, and epicentre of the Boko Haram attacks. To top members of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) then, the Chibok Girls abduction could be a ploy to destabilise Jonathan’s government.
Governor Kasim Shettima, a member of the All Progressive Congress (APC), was quoted to have said Jonathan did not believe those girls were abducted until 19 days later when he talked to him on phone. Former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo corroborated this view.
“In our own case, Your Excellency, after the Chibok abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in April, 2014, it took 19 days for me to receive a call from the Presidency,” Shettima said.
According to observers, when campaign for the 2015 election was heightened, Chibok Girls predicament became subject of campaign while APC at various platform tongue-lashed Jonathan-led government for its failure to rescue the school girls.
PDP made several promises to ensure those girls were back home alive, but sadly, those promises were unfulfilled until the party was unseated at the March 2015 presidential election.
Interestingly, former minister of petroleum, Tam David-West asked Jonathan to resign as president if the search for the girls abducted produces no positive result.
He wanted him to take a cue from the South Korean Prime Minister, Chung Hong-won, who tendered his resignation following a boat mishap that claimed the lives of over 300 persons.
Buhari’s failure
However, after one year into the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, the waiting game for the girls’ rescue continues as analysts were stunned when Buhari during his first presidential media chat said that, “there was no intelligence report on whereabouts of Chibok Girls.”
Is #Bringbackourgirls a Scam or reality?
But the poser of the years has been whether the Chibok Girls were truly kidnapped or not? Is it actually a reality or a scam as many controversial figures have argued. Few months after the tragedy, the leader of Niger Delta Peoples Volunteer Force (NDPVF), Mujahid Dokubo Asari expressed doubt about the abduction of Chibok girls, saying it was a scam.
According to Mujahid Dokubo Asari, these are “the right questions begging for answers: why there is such difference in the testimony given by the principal, why none of the girls while trekking from Chibok (almost km) at night didn’t try to escape.”
He wondered why people called for resignation of the President Goodluck Jonathan, but not a word about the Governor of Borno State, “who against the counsel of WAEC and the federal ministry of education allowed the girls to write the exams in Chibok.”
He added: “What is the relationship between the APC and Boko Haram?…why was it possible for the APC government in Yobe state to conduct local government election without the sound of a single knockout? What superior security arrangement do they have and why was it not deployed in Chibok to prevent the ‘abduction’ of the girls?
Like Dokubo Asari, Ekiti State Governor, Ayo Fayose recently in his usual style said no student of Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State were abducted by Boko Haram.
The governor said this emphatically in a workshop on political Aspirants Capacity Enhancement which was organised by the Women Arise for change initiative for Women of Ekiti, Osun and Ondo State.
Bring back our girls group
The report of the missing girls was politically motivated to influence public opinion against Goodluck Jonathan, Fayose argued.
“Today, many opposition leaders are underground, and I don’t think any of these girls is missing. It is a political strategy. Who is fooling who? If you wanted to use it to remove some people, you have succeeded already. I don’t know if there are missing girls, but no indication has shown that. It is a political strategy,” the governor was quoted saying.
For Dokubo Asari, Fayose and others who say it is a scam, public affairs analysts wondered if they are not aware that the leadership of Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the abduction.
It would be recalled that, the leader of the dreaded Islamic sect Boko Haram Abubakar Shekau claimed responsibility for the kidnap in the video released three weeks after the incident. He said now he owned the girls and would sell them in the market. Is it possible to regard admission of responsibility by Boko Haram as a scam? If it is truly a scam, how long would this lasts?
On the other hand, if the abduction is a reality, where are these hapless girls? Are they still alive or dead? If they are alive, is there hope that they would return one day? These are posers begging for answers.
Chibok girls parents
Hope rekindled
In May 2016, one of the more than 200 schoolgirls abducted by the Boko Haram insurgents from the Nigerian town of Chibok was found, a development which rekindled the seemingly failed hope of likely return of the girls.
The girl, named as Amina Nkek, was reportedly discovered by a vigilante group after a fight with suspected militants for the Islamic extremist group on the edge of the Sambisa Forest in Borno State where it has long been thought they were held.
The girl is said to have told a vigilante who knew her and confirmed her identity that most of the girls were being held in the forest, but that six of the 219 originally abducted had died. An uncle, Yakubu Nkeki reportedly said she was 17 when abducted and is now 19.
Analysts
Speaking with the Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Ilorin Branch, Barrister Manzuma Issah who would not believe the Chibok Girls palaver is a scam, described that argument as unfortunate and embarrassing to the image of Nigeria.
He noted that over the years, the issue of Chibok Girls’ abduction had been of concern to the international community, calling on President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration to ensure the school girls are rescue. It’s not too late, he says.
Also, a budding human rights activist, Abdulkareem Mohammed Alabi the school girls’ abduction “is not a scam.”
“From all available facts, the abduction is not a scam. You have to look at the people raising the issue of the abduction being a scam, they are people of faulty credibility and integrity,” Alabi argued.
Some of the over 200 secondary school girls kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists
On his part, Barrister Yusuf Aluko, an Ilorin-based legal practitioner, believes the tragedy could be framed up.
Aluko told NAIJ.com: “If you follow the events, parents of the school girls have constantly featured in the media demanding for the release of their children.
“On the other hand, Boko Haram issues now had been dealt, but one would wonder where are there girls? Are they dead or they were flown out of the country? Also, there have been conflicting figures of the actual number of the girls missing. The first figure was different from the ones contained in the school register as provided by the Principal. The whole thing could be far from the truth. I am afraid that it could be framed up,” he said.
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