Growing anger over Chibok abductions – The Sun

May Day rallies were marred by protests in several parts of the country last week as workers and other angry Nigerians took the Federal Government to task over the 234 schoolgirls abducted from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno State, three weeks ago.

From Kano to Lagos, Abuja, Maiduguri, Ilorin and several other parts of the country, protesters are asking one question: where are our daughters?

The abduction of the girls on April 15 has since assumed an international dimension, as the protesters have now taken over the Internet and other social media platforms in a campaign themed “Bring Back Our Girls”.

Indeed, there is growing global anger over the seizure of these schoolgirls. The anger is over both the actual kidnap of the girls and the perception that the Nigerian government is not doing anything serious about rescuing them, while certain elements within and outside government, are politicizing the matter. Worse still, the government is carrying on with its subtle campaign for the 2015 general election, in spite of the missing girls.

While one would not expect the federal government to give away its modalities for the eventual rescue of the abducted schoolgirls, we feel the authorities ought to be able to communicate with the people, and convince them of the robustness of its plan for the rescue of the captives. This has not been done. It was only during Sunday’s Presidential Media Chat, over two weeks since the kidnapping, that President Goodluck Jonathan gave some insight into what has been going on, even as he lamented the seeming lack of full co-operation from the parents and wards of the missing children. What the nation has been getting are unconvincing assurances that the girls will be found, that are apparently made for political correctness. But, what Nigerians need is concrete action.

Even if this matter has gone beyond the capacity of government, given the international dimension to this insurgency and terrorism at large, there is no shame in the federal government seeking assistance from outside the country.

This is also a situation in which the authorities should be giving daily updates on rescue efforts, as was the case with the search for the   missing Malaysian Airline plane and the rescue efforts of the sunken South Korean ferry.

Instead, what we have in the country is a seeming disinterest on the part of the government as it forges ahead with its activities, as we have been told, not to give the impression that Boko Haram is succeeding in disrupting the activities of government. Who, exactly, is the government trying to impress with such a ludicrous position?

The time has come for the Federal Government to come off its high horse and get down to brass tacks on this embarrassing and utterly distressful situation. How, exactly are we going to get these girls back? That should be the primary assignment of government today. Let the authorities put unhelpful niceties and phony confidence aside and get down to work on getting the girls back. Whether by dialogue or force, the girls must be found.

It is bad enough that in a state that is under emergency rule, some people could move to a school in a convoy of trailers and pick-up vans and cart away 234 students after razing down their school, and drive off in a reportedly slow moving convoy with some rickety vehicles breaking down now and again, yet nobody spotted them or raised an alarm. This, in itself, throws a very shady penumbra on the competence and sincerity of our security apparatchik. But, the current not-too-committal attitude of the government to this abduction is simply unacceptable.

In a world where the prime minister of South Korea resigned over his government’s alleged poor handling of the rescue operations on the tragic ferry that sank with over 400 persons – mainly teenage school children, our government carries on as though all is well. While we are not calling on President Jonathan to resign, he should do something to ensure the release of the girls.

To make matters worse, it took almost three weeks to release the names of the abducted girls, and their photographs. The source of the list is already also being questioned.

Meanwhile, the security operatives themselves have only just woken up to the need to interview, and debrief, the 48 or so students who  escaped from their abductors.

The result of this seeming slowness is that three weeks after this incident, the whole thing is still shrouded in mystery, and nothing concrete has been heard about the girls that are still missing.

The entire country, nay, the world, has now been left in a guessing game: What is the fate of the girls? Have they been divided into groups? Are they serving as sex slaves? Have they been sold into outright slavery or given out in forced marriages? Are they still within the borders of Nigeria? Boko Haram leader, Abubakar    Shekau, has vowed to sell the abducted girls into slavery? Can we stop this from happening?

Government has not been able to give authoritative answers to these questions, save for unconfirmed, third party reports from different sources. What is most annoying to the people is the seeming go-to-hell silence on the part of government.

It is because of this that we, and other concerned people all over the world, have begun to fear that Nigeria is gradually slipping into a journey to Somalia and Rwanda without realising it. We expect the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces to do everything that is necessary to stem this drift. And, the place to begin is to rescue the Chibok girls immediately. Nothing less will do.