The Provost, Adeniran Adeniran Ogunsanya College of Education (AOCOED), Otto/Ijanikin, Mr Wasiu Olalekan Bashorun and the former Vice Chancellor of the Covenant University, Ota, Ogun State, Prof Aize Obayan, have described the abduction of over 200 school girls at the Government Secondary School Chibok Borno State, as detrimental to girl-child education.
The teenage girls were abducted on April 14 by the dreaded Boko Haram sect, and are yet to be found despite intelligence assistance from the United States and United Kingdom.
Speaking with The Nation, Bashorun said the abduction deprives the girls of their rights and indicts society for failing to cater for them.
He said: “To start with, this incident portends violation of the fundamental human rights of the girl-child and the ethical and moral responsibility of the society to give protection to the children.
“The gender insensitivity and flagrant abuse of the girl-child is quite unfortunate. This issue is not about Chibok or about Borno State nor about Northeastern part of the country, but an injury to the soul of this nation. It is the worst kind of incident that can happen to Nigeria; this is a sledge hammer smashing the body-less souls of our children. The abduction of these children is a missile attack on our collective conscience as a nation.”
The provost urged Nigerians not to rest until they are found.
“All of us must rise up to the situation and collectively speak and act to guarantee their release before further damage is done to their psyche, physiological and biological composition. These girls were about to sit for their final year examination when insurgents invaded their schools. These girls barely 12 and 13 years old, were training to fend for themselves, to contribute to development of their communities and to be useful citizens,” he said.
He also appealed to the abductors to release the girls.
“It is not fair to use these poor children as pawns in whatever game that is being played out in our nation,” he said.
To forestall future occurrence, Bashorun suggested a complete overhaul of the nation’s system with respect to education, security, infrastructural, religious, social and moral values.
On her part, Prof Obayan said it is absolutely wrong for the abducted girls to be turned into cheap commodity that would be sold off.
“As women, our contributions globally to issues bordering on health, economy, education, social work and what have you, cannot be over emphasised. Therefore, for anybody to think we can be merely turned to something cheap that can be sold off in the market bothers me,” Obayan said.
Speaking on its remote and future implication she added: “Nigeria will be the worst for it as it will deny these innocent girls their future contributions to nation’s development and further the opportunity of becoming useful citizens.
“The so-called morals and social values that we are struggling to instill in the child will be a mirage. On the long run, fairness, justice, equity and understanding of love for one’s nation will diminish, ditto for the child’s ability to trust and adapt to changing environment.”
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