Over 3 months after abduction…Jonathan meets Chibok parents

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday met with parents of the abducted Chibok schoolgirls, for the first time since the students were taken by Boko Haram gunmen more than three months ago.The over 200-member delegation from Chibok, Borno State, included 51 escapee girls and their parents, parents of girls who are still in captivity, and other community […]

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday met with parents of the abducted Chibok schoolgirls, for the first time since the students were taken by Boko Haram gunmen more than three months ago.
The over 200-member delegation from Chibok, Borno State, included 51 escapee girls and their parents, parents of girls who are still in captivity, and other community leaders.
During the meeting, held at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, President Jonathan assured the parents that the missing girls would be freed. He also said he will visit Chibok when the kidnapped girls have been released.
The parents were led to the meeting by Chibok Elders Forum leader Dr. Pogu Bitrus. Others present included Senate President David Mark, Governor Kashim Shettima, Bauchi State Governor Isa Yuguda, Chibok Local Government Council chairman, and some Federal officials.
Contrary to Jonathan’s assurance last week that the event would be open to the media, officials yesterday drove journalists out of the venue and also shielded the girls and their parents from newsmen after the meeting.
But one of the leaders who attended the meeting gave Daily Trust an account of what transpired.
He said a number of the parents took turns to speak, where they lamented the failure of government to contain the Boko Haram sect, which has continued to wage brazen, deadly attacks on villages and towns in Borno State.
He said they informed the president that they agreed to see him at the Villa out of respect for his office, as otherwise what they deserved was to be visited and comforted at their village.
“We told him (Jonathan) ideally we should be sympathised with and consoled but we decided to accept the invitation because of the respect we have for the position of the president,” he said.
“The president told us that he will only visit Chibok after the girls are rescued as according to him, he will not want to go and meet the parents in anguish but will rather visit to rejoice with them.
“We also lamented the failure of the security forces to stamp out Boko Haram which made them stronger in recent times. We told him how people have been displaced and forced into becoming refugees in Cameroon and other states.
“Damboa, Gwazo, Biu, Mubi, Askira Uba and even Chibok itself have all been wiped out with over 200,000 now as refugees. We also informed him of the impending food crisis because our people could not farm this season as no one can visit their farmlands.”
The Chibok delegation requested the Federal Government to provide aid to people of the North-East, rebuild the destroyed Government Secondary School Chibok where the schoolgirls were abducted on April 14, and also build a new school in Chibok.
Jonathan also told them that he will do everything within his power to stamp out Boko Haram and that he is holding talks with “those who matter” to get the abducted girls released.
“The president said he won’t use the word ‘negotiation’, but that he is doing his best talking to those concerned towards freeing the girls and that very soon they will be freed,” a parent told Daily Trust.
One of the parents also pleaded with Jonathan to stop politicising the Chibok abduction and the insecurity in the North-East. In his response, Jonathan assured that he is not playing politics with the abduction and the insecurity.
Three of the schoolgirls who fled from Boko Haram after their abduction narrated how they escaped from their captors.
One of them said she jumped out of the truck while they were being ferried to a location and ran away.
Another girl said she was taken to Sambisa Forest together with 270 others but four of them managed to escape after they sneaked out of the camp when militants guarding them went to bring food to them.
Three of them were later found by Fulani herders and taken back to Chibok while the fourth girl trekked in the bush until she found herself in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.
A Daily Trust source said Governor Shettima said at the meeting that he will cooperate with the Federal Government to rescue the girls and end the insurgency in the state.
Shettima said he has put politics aside as he no longer participates in political activities organised by his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Others at the meeting included officials of the Chibok Area Development Association, House of Representatives member Peter Biye, Chibok state lawmaker, as well as principal and members of the Parent-Teacher Association of the Chibok secondary school.
‘We will get the girls’
Later yesterday, Presidential spokesman Reuben Abati issued a statement on the meeting, saying Jonathan assured the parents that the government “is doing everything humanly possible to rescue the over 200 girls…and return them safely to their parents.”
“Anyone who gives you the impression that we are aloof and that we are not doing what we are supposed to do to get the girls out is not being truthful,” Jonathan told the parents, according to Abati’s statement.
“Our commitment is not just to get the girls out, it is also to rout Boko Haram completely from Nigeria. But we are very, very mindful of the safety of the girls. We want to return them all alive to their parents. If they are killed in any rescue effort, then we have achieved nothing.”
The President said although he was yet to visit Chibok in the aftermath of the abductions, his heart was constantly with its traumatised parents and people, and his desire was to visit them when their daughters have been freed.
He also assured that Chibok and other communities in the three North-Eastern states most affected by the Boko Haram insurgency will be the first beneficiaries of the Victims’ Support Fund, the Presidential Initiative for the North-East, the Safe Schools Initiative and other programmes aimed at addressing the damage caused by the Boko Haram insurgency.
The statement said others who spoke at the meeting included a district head Mr. Zannamadu Usman, Borno House of Assembly member Aminu Foni Chibok, some parents, and three of the girls who escaped from their captors, Godia Simon, Dorcas Musa and Joy Bishara.