Tag: Chibok girls

Nigeria marked another inglorious milestone last week as the abduction of more than 200 students from the Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok in Borno State turned two years, without the girls being rescued. Those abductions, by global consensus, dealt one of the most violent assaults in human history to child rights as well as girl-child education; and that is not to mention the crushing agony of parents whose wards were taken away. In a region of this country where much work yet needs to be done to change the cultural indisposition to girl education, the Chibok girls were shining role models. The abductees were in the thick of their Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination when Boko Haram insurgents struck at their hostels in the dead of night, herding some 276 students onto trucks that headed off to God-knows-where. Fifty-seven of those girls managed to escape as the trucks hastened off, and have since returned home. But the fate and whereabouts of those remaining have been an embarrassing mystery and a raw sore on the conscience of this nation.

The second year remembrance last week was against the backdrop of chronic leadership failure, missed opportunities and yet to be effectual promises of diplomatic intervention. There is no debate that the costliest leadership failure in the whole episode was the reluctant and disoriented response by the former administration of President Goodluck Jonathan, which was in office at the time, such that precious time was lost in intercepting the fleeing insurgents and rescuing the abducted girls. That administration simply never seemed to believe that the girls were truly abducted, and notoriously signposted its disbelief with the infamous “There is God oooo!!” declaration by the former First Lady. But you see, that is how disconnected from reality politics gets when it is played for its sake. The Chibok abductions happened during an election year in this country, and the Jonathanians just seemed to think political opposition at the time orchestrated the alarm for some electoral gain. Not a few believed that even with a slightly belated response by the government machinery, the situation could still have been helped if the former administration had given the terrorists some pursuit, since you do not make hundreds of abductees and the means with which they were being conveyed vanish overnight. But the Jonathan administration failed to play that line, and instead conducted campaign-oriented inquisitions in Abuja as to whether or not there had truly been abductions. Regrettably, that gave Boko Haram the time to hide the girls away, as they have remained hidden even until now. Eventually, the administration that chose to play politics with such national emergency is itself history now.

Regardless of what Jonathanians did or failed to do, the Chibok girls debacle has been inherited by the present administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, and it is trite that the administration now has the responsibility to bring the girls back home. Thus far, there is little to cheer in that regard. Much as military forces have made huge strides under the present leadership in recovering territory from Boko Haram and severely decimating the terrorists’ ranks, the abducted girls are yet to be located, much less rescued – two years on. Relentless crusading by indefatigable activists of the ‘BringBackOurGirls’ movement has not been effectual in forcing positive results. Yet, many had wished that the milestone last week was not reached, and I suspect that this issue is one of the reasons the world is cynical about recent claims by the Buhari administration that the insurgency has been defeated.

The international community was sufficiently outraged by the abduction of the Chibok girls, and leading countries volunteered pledges of logistical and intelligence support for their rescue. But those pledges have yet to yield any result two years on. The girls have not been rescued, and neither has there been any useful intelligence as to where they are being held. The closest indication of intelligence surveillance was an after-the-fact claim by former British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Dr. Andrew Pocock, to the effect that the United Kingdom and United States once knew the whereabouts of some of the abducted girls, but could do nothing to rescue them. Speaking to The Sunday Times of London in March, the envoy said about 80 of the missing girls were spotted by UK and US surveillance officials not long after their being abducted, but the Western governments felt powerless to offer help as any rescue attempt would have been too risky if Boko Haramists used the girls as human shields.

Pocock’s narrative, as reported, went thus: “A couple of months after the kidnapping, fly-bys and an American eye in the sky spotted a group of up to 80 girls at a particular spot in the Sambisa forest, around a very large tree called locally the Tree of Life, along with evidence of vehicular movement and a large encampment.” According to him, the Chibok girls were there for at least four weeks, but the authorities were ‘powerless’ to intervene. “A land-based attack would have been seen coming miles away, and the girls killed. An air-based rescue, such as flying in helicopters or Hercules, would have required large numbers, and that meant a significant risk to the rescuers, and even more so to the girls,” he added. Perhaps the strongest disincentive for the Western powers, as the envoy was reported, was that the former Jonathan administration did not ask for help. But you would wonder why those powers slipped off the surveillance, for whatever it took to track the terrorists.

Well, there appears to be a fresh hope that the Chibok girls are yet alive and well, and could be brought home. A video surfaced late last week showing 15 of the girls being interrogated, as proof that they were alive and could be bargained for, by the government, with their captors. In that video, the girls maintained a calm countenance and showed no visible signs of their ordeal in captivity. They were largely emotionless, and only an occasional hesitation in their individual responses to questions by a male voice behind the camera betrayed any intimation of fear in them. The video is reported to have been recorded on Christmas Day, last year, as part of negotiations between the Buhari administration and Boko Haram. One of the girls shown in the video, Naomi Zakaria, made an appeal at the end of the two-minute clip urging the government to help unite the abductees with their families. “I am speaking on 25th December 2015 on behalf of all the Chibok girls and we are all well,” she added.

I dare say the video was heart wrenching for any humane viewer, even more so for Chibok parents who were reported to have confirmed the girls to truly be their missing wards. CNN correspondent, Nima Elbagir, said in her report that the video was sourced from someone keen to give the girls’ parents hope that some of their daughters were yet alive, and to motivate the government to help get them freed. But the government is understandably wary, against the backdrop of Jonathan administration’s experience with negotiators. Minister of Information Lai Mohammed, in the CNN report, confirmed that government was in possession of the video, and he acknowledged that government was in some talks with persons that supplied it towards securing the Chibok girls’ release. But he was cautious about the recording being valid as current proof of the girls’ well-being.

And I see his point: It is difficult to believe that the notoriously bestial Boko Haramists, two years on, have humanely treated the Chibok girls as this new video suggests. But anything is worth the try to rescue the abducted girls. The government is here encouraged to follow through with the negotiations, even as the military keep up with assaults against the terrorists.