148 days after Boko Haram abducted over 200 school girls from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno State, the parents and relatives still grapple with the reality that the girls may never return home. In this interview with GRACE OBIKE, the Director of Publicity of Kibaku Area Development Association (KADA), the association representing the Chibok people in Abuja, Dr. Manasseh Allen, speaks on the travails of the parents and residents of the area since the abduction.
hat does it feel like coming from Chibok?
Coming from Chibok is something that is natural and I cannot change it, but, at times, I really feel like I am placed in a very difficult situation. Let me say a disadvantage position . Here you find yourself among poor people who have no voice and suffering from what they cannot solve by themselves.
Has the President fulfilled any of the promises he made to your people?
Not even one; when we came last time to see Mr President, he promised us that he was going to do everything possible to rescue the girls, which is the most important thing to us, to see this girls coming back and continue with their normal lives. But, till date, no information as to what has been done in regards to rescuing these girls or as to solve the security challenges in the community. People are still leaving in fear. People lost houses, businesses and some were forced to relocate to other parts.
So, would you say the President lied to the Chibok community?
In a way, I may not really say lie but when you make a promise and did not fulfil, then one has to question a lot of things in that regard. If the government can accept the fact that they said that they know the location of these girls and 148 days after, no issue of having them back or informing or giving hints to the parents that this is how far we have gone regarding the girls, I think something is wrong there.
If the President promised to see the end of insurgency and day in, day out and communities are being lost to the insurgents means, that we are still far from having that promise fulfilled and if you did not solve the continuous attacks on the communities and even the seizures of some local governments in the Northeast, you cannot develop people that are living in fear. If you build schools, for sure, they will still burn the schools again; if you build or rehabilitate any hospital, they will still go ahead and burn it down. The most important thing is making security a first class priority.
Based on what I heard from the President and what they intend to do, it is not applicable to the present situation we find ourselves.
How do your people feel so far after meeting the President?
When they came, they were really anticipating something good and when we met with Mr President and the fact that he gave us all the time we needed was very good to them. So, they were really anticipating something good but looking at the preceding events after the visit, our people started casting doubts on a lot of things, especially when the issue of money came in and not really clearly handled. Some people were sceptical about the whole issue.
Do your people feel supported by the government?
No they feel abandoned.
After the issue with the money came up, has there been a rapport with the government on the issue?
The issue was really straight but they made it complicated in the sense that, these are poor people; they came to see their president, had meeting with the President and he gave them a place to stay. If I come to see my President and he knows that I am a poor person, displaced and without food or mattress to sleep on and I don’t have all these things and need them all and he decides to give me something to support myself, it should be something open and in an open way that you do not need to hide anything.
I was personally not against Mr President helping poor people, who are Nigerians and need it but the manner in which the money issue was handled was not good because these people have structures. They came to Abuja with their traditional leaders, the Principal and medical practitioners that can speak regarding health challenges in that community. So, if the Presidency needs to help these poor people, they have structures. They should have been asked their needs and it should be handled in that regards, because they need not just to send somebody in the middle of the night to come and be moving from one room to the other, waking people and distributing something in envelopes in the absence of the structures that brought them to Abuja. It was wrong and our leaders were angry that the issue of money came deliberately to ridicule their efforts in the issue of the struggle to bring back the girls.
The President promised to instruct NEMA to distribute relief materials to your people, did it happen?
NEMA was in Chibok one or two weeks after the abduction but after our visit to Mr President, NEMA has not been to Chibok. We have not seen anything from NEMA, up till today, nothing.
A governor said some of the girls were actually abducted before the main incident that made the news, is it true?
It is not true, it is completely false because somebody like me, I stay in Chibok, I am from Chibok and virtually know majority of these girls by name. In my extended family alone, about 26 girls are part of those abducted. So, if somebody is coming out to say that it is a scam, it is most unfortunate. I always say that Chibok is in Nigeria and not a foreign land that is difficult for security agents to investigate whatever information someone gives. That school is the only school that we have in Chibok; in fact, in the neighbouring local government; it is the only female school in that location. So, it is normal to have a large number of students in such schools because Chibok is missionary-based and we look at education as the only means that we have to position ourselves in Nigeria.
So, the issue that how can a village school have the large population of girls at the same time, writing the same exams is uncalled for because you can actually find more than that in our local government. We have boys who cannot get admission into an ordinary Government Secondary School; if we had more schools, we know that we will have a larger number of these people in such schools.
Someone was also saying how is it possible to move over 200 girls from one school? What kind of car will be used? Some people will even go to the extent of analysing the number of vehicle needed to convey such a large number of girls out of school. Let me tell you something, they picked a large wooden 911 truck belonging to a private business man; he is not even from Chibok. They offloaded bags of maize from the truck and loaded these girls into the truck. And how many Toyota hilux did these people come with and how many cars were taken from Chibok? They took a lot of cars.
I know that every girl that we say is missing is truly missing and for anybody to have doubts and call us names, saying it is a scam is very unfortunate.
I personally took more than 20 foreign journalists to Chibok. They went there, visited the parents and even saw the personal belongings of these girls to be sure that people are missing. By the way, what does one stand to benefit from lying to Nigerians that my daughter is missing? Let me tell you. If today they can bring my people back, I can tell you that you will not hear anything from us again. Nobody is interested in safe school programme or the Presidential initiative or whatever you call it. All they ask is to bring their daughters back and secure their community which is the statutory responsibility of the government.
Instead of people understanding with us and joining us in the fight, some people are busy blaming the opposition, and saying that it is an intentional ploy to make the administration of Goodluck difficult. It is unfortunate. This is something happening to teenagers, innocent girls, some of them have never seen a tarred road before or travelled anywhere. If you see it, it is a village school; they can’t even get enough quality education like their counterparts in other parts of the country and some people are casting doubts and calling it a scam.
Do your people sleep in the bushes still?
It is absolutely true. Most of my people used to sleep in the bush for fear of Boko Haram. Few weeks ago, some teenagers spent the night outside and when coming back in the morning, they were abducted in Tukurumbula village and till date, we don’t know their whereabouts. A pastor went to sleep outside his home for fear and on his way back in the morning; he was ambushed and taken away. We have not seen him till today and he is my in-law.
Things happen, people go out to sleep in the bush and return to their houses in the morning but recently things are not so bad because after taking over Gwoza, most of the insurgents have relocated to Gwoza and we are having relative peace in Chibok and the Chibok main village, most of the Boko Haram members have moved over to their headquarters in Gwoza.
Do you people still believe that the girls can be returned after 148 days?
On the perspective of faith and my own personal faith in God, I am optimistic that even if all of the girls do not return, a good number of them will come back. But on the side of the reality that I see on the ground, I am sceptical because it is taking too long. Over 148 days, I’m afraid that it is taking too long.
Have the parents of the girls performed the burial ritual of the girls as reported?
It is not true. No parent performed any burial ritual of their daughter in abduction; but some of the parents are really looking at it as if these girls are dead; please inform us that they are dead so that we can make up our minds to start living but if they are alive, then bring them back. We are still praying that they come back.
Do you feel abandoned by Nigerians?
I feel like there is a level of complexity because if this were to have happened in another country, I’m sure that the seat of government would be made too hot until the girls return but we Nigerians forgive easily and are not really our brothers’ keepers as we are supposed to be. I’m sorry for saying that but that is the fact.
But Nigerians need to wake up and join the advocacy because today it is Chibok, who knows where it will be tomorrow? Because Boko Haram is a terrorists group, Nigerians need to all come together and let us fight it together.
What is your take on the new slogan of #BringBackGoodluck2015?
This is what I call the poverty of the mind in the sense that people don’t have the sympathy or empathy of others because if at all I am pro-Jonathan, what does shouting to bring back our girls have to do with the seat of government? Unfortunately people think that advocating for the girls to be brought back is to ridicule the government of Jonathan. It’s unfortunate.
