The front-line advocacy group for the return of the kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls, Bring Back Our Girls campaign commended President Muhammadu Buhari on the December deadline set for ending insurgency.
The group, which is commonly referred to by its Twitter hashtag, #BringBackOurGirls, noted the President Buhari has personally made the promise to end insurgency by December this year, and has made necessary trips towards achieving that aim, as a result the group comments his efforts.
READ: Opinion: What Happens To #BringBackOurGirls Now That Its Founder Is In Gov’t
The group, however, was silent on the return or fate of the Chibok girls, which is the reason the group was formed by a front-line member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Hadiza Bala Usman and former minister of Education under Obasanjo, Oby Ezekwesili.
Analysts have accused the group on reneging on its core purpose of seeing the return of the Chibok school girls to their families since the All Progressives Congress (APC) won the presidential elections in March 2015.
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Speaking at the group’s sit-out at Unity Fountain in Abuja, Sunday, August 2, 2015, one of the leaders, Dauda Iliya noted that the timeline given by president Buhari is a welcome development, stating that the people of the northeast have great respect and believe in the presidency and what the president has done so far and greatly believe that under him, the issue of insurgency will end very soon.
“The president’s deadline is on course, with his position of strength after great consultations. He is a man of integrity. We believe that before the end of the year, the war against insurgency would have been long ended. We in Borno are seeing the effect already,” Iliya noted.
The group further urged president Buhari to put in more efforts towards improving the welfare of the military in order to boost their moral in the fight against insurgency.
Ms. Usman has gone on to be appointed as the chief of staff to APC chieftain, Nasir El Rufai who is now governor of Kaduna State, after serving in Buhari’s inauguration committee. Her appointment into Buhari’s first committee received widespread outrage from Nigerians.
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Ezekwesili is rumoured to be on Buhari’s ministerial shortlist. Some observers fear that she may have been removed from consideration after her public outburst criticizing Buhari for his comments in the United States which suggested that his government planned to treat the North better than the South, over voting patterns in the 2015 elections.
At the peak of the #BringBackOurGirls campaign, the Nigerian government which was led by Dr. Goodluck Jonathan had said that the group was formed and run by the then opposition party, the APC to tarnish the image of the federal government. Ezekwesili was identified as a ”pawn in the hands of desperate politicians”. The Nigerian military, in May 2015, cautioned Ezekwesili and the Bring Back Our Girls Group against hate campaigns.
Buhari made the promise to end Boko Haram’s insurgency by December this year on a trip to neighbouring Benin Republic seeking co-operation in the fight against Boko Haram.
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