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Tag: Dapchi

  • [2014 – 2021] Timeline of mass school kidnappings in Nigeria

    [2014 – 2021] Timeline of mass school kidnappings in Nigeria

    Gun wielding daredevils have for a couple of years launched coordinated attacks on educational institutions in Nigeria particularly in the northern part.

    Unfortunately, school children have become the latest high-profile kidnapping targets in these attacks.

    What stated as a strange occurrence in Chibok, Borno State in 2014 is fast becoming the norm seven years after, with the latest happening on Friday (today).

    Suspected gunmen attacked a school in Zamfara State, abducting scores of students in the third mass abduction in the past three months.

    The attackers stormed the Government Girls Secondary School in Jangebe in the wee hours of the day.

    Hours later, the Zamfara State Police Command confirmed that three hundred and seventeen students (317) were abducted in the latest kidnapping, a development which Amnesty International described as an “attack on education in Northern Nigeria.”

    TheNewsGuru.com, TNG listed below a compilation of the attacks by suspected gunmen from 2014 to date:

    14th April 2014: Boko Haram terrorists invade Chibok School

    The first of these school abductions dated back to April 14th, 2014 when terrorist group Boko Haram attacked the Girls Secondary School in Chibok, a town on the border between Borno and Adamawa states.

    About two hundred students were said to have been kidnapped during the attack in the northeast, a region ravaged by incessant assaults by the terror group.

    The country’s security agencies in the wake of the abduction moved to rescue the schoolchildren. The efforts have yielded some results as 107 of them have been reunited with their families.

    19th Feb. 2018: Boko Haram terrorists abduct Dapchi School Girls in Yobe State

    Barely four years after the attack on Chibok, the insurgents took their onslaught to Yobe, another state in the troubled northwest region. The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed confirmed that 110 students were kidnapped after Boko Haram invaded the Government Girls Science Technical College (GGSTC) in Dapchi, on Monday, February 19, 2018.

    When the gunmen attacked the all-girls boarding school, many residents of the town had thought they were security forces as they came in camouflaged vehicles.

    Although most of the students have reunited with their families after they were released (on March 21, 2018) by their abductors, Leah Sharibu, is yet to be freed by the gunmen. Reports suggest the 14-year-old, a Christian, wasn’t freed with the others because she refused to convert to Islam.

    Her continued stay in the terrorists’ den has become a subject of national and global interests. But the Nigerian government says it is committed to getting her out of captivity

    11th Dec. 2020: Gunmen Kidnap Kankara Boys

    While the country battles to eradicate terror attacks from Boko Haram, mass kidnapping of schoolchildren spread to the northwestern region. On Friday, December 11th, bandits took three hundred and three students of Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina into captivity.

    The incident which happened just as President Buhari embarked on a week-long vacation in his home state of Katsina, security experts believe, further underscored the porous nature of Nigerian schools.

    But, a week after the students were taken into captivity, their abductors released them. The government denied paying a ransom to secure the students from the all-boys educational institution.

    The presidency had said the release of the students is a pointer to the administration’s resolve to ensure the safety of Nigerians, thanking security agencies for their swiftness.

    Feb. 17th 2021: Bandits abduct another 41 In Kagara, Niger State

    Gunmen invaded a school in Niger State on Wednesday, February 17th, 2021 kidnapping 41 persons.

    The gunmen raided the Government Science College Kagara, Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, capturing students, teachers, and their family members from the school. Twenty-seven students were among the abductees.

    Buhari had, following the incident, given a marching order to security agents to rescue the students and ensure they return and are reunited with their parents unhurt.

    The State governor, Abubakar Sani Bello had also ordered the closure of all boarding schools in the northcentral state, a move he said, was to forestall similar mass abduction.

    26th Feb. 2021: 317 Female Students Abducted In Jangebe, Zamfara State

    Less than ten days after the bandits raided Kagara, gunmen kidnapped 317 schoolgirls from the Government Girls Science Secondary School Jangebe in Jangebe, Zamfara State. The incident happened on Friday, February 26th, 2021

    The all-female school located in Talata-Mafara Local Government Area of the state was attacked past midnight. Police authorities in Zamfara say rescue efforts are in top gear, calling for calm among residents of the state.

  • Huge ransom payment for Kankara, Dapchi students’ release, FG speaks

    Huge ransom payment for Kankara, Dapchi students’ release, FG speaks

    The Federal Government on Saturday debunked rumours of payment of ransom for the release of the abducted Kankara schoolboys in Katsina State and the Dapchi schoolgirls in Yobe State.

    The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed revealed this in an interview on a monitored Channels Television interview on Saturday.

    “All these stories about ransom, are conspiracy theories,” the minister said.

    The minister’s comments come days after another abduction of students in Kangara, Niger State, was executed.

    TheNewsGuru.com, TNG reports that some Nigerians on social media alleged that the federal government has already paid Eight Hundred Million (N800,000,000:00) ransom to the bandits to free the abducted Kangara victims.

    See some of the allegations on Twitter:

    https://twitter.com/Enitan_sam/status/1363032577829974019?s=20

    https://twitter.com/ij_kush/status/1363022495582998529?s=20

    TNG reports that the Kangara incident is the latest in the series of coordinated abductions carried out by bandits across the country, particular in the north.

    Reacting to the incident, the minister who had on Wednesday visited the state with a Federal Government delegation to assess the situation, said the government is putting various strategies in place to curb the menace.

    “Government has put in place various strategies to contain banditry, insurgency and kidnapping.

    “Some of these measures are kinetic, some are non-kinetic,” Mr Lai Mohammed said.

    He, however, ruled out the option of a ransom being paid for their release.

    When asked: Will a ransom be part of the government’s strategy? the minister said: “No”.

    He continued by saying: “I can assure you that the government is on top of the matter – but it is not a subject matter for television discussion.

    “We didn’t get there overnight, that is why we can’t get out in one day”.

    According to the minister, bandits and terrorists work with the psychology of people and they deliberately attack mostly women and children because they believe that is what is going to attract global outcry.

    “That is exactly what bandits do all over the world,” he said, adding that “solidarity in any form will not be tolerated by this government”.

    Armed men attacked the Government Science College Kagara in Rafi Local Government Area of Niger State in the early hours of Wednesday, shooting sporadically, before abducting some students, staff members, and their families.

    One student was also killed in the incident.

    The operations started from the staff quarters and ended in the students’ hostels and in the process, other students were also wounded by gunshots.

    The gunmen who were said to have worn military uniforms gathered some staff and students at a place for hours before moving them out of the school premises to an unknown destination.

  • From Dapchi to Kankara: ‘Slap’ on Buhari’s face, By Ehichioya Ezomon

    From Dapchi to Kankara: ‘Slap’ on Buhari’s face, By Ehichioya Ezomon

    By Ehichioya Ezomon

    The title of a Shakespeare play, “All’s well that ends well,” aptly captures the sigh of relief that trails the December 17, 2020, safe return of 340 students of the Government Science Secondary School (GSSS), Kankara, Katsina State, North-West of Nigeria.
    Yes, “sigh of relief,” and not “excitement” that would normally pervade the families of the “lucky” schoolboys and official circles, because gaining freedom for the boys is government’s responsibility in its duty to “protect life and property” of the citizens.
    Had the government failed in that regard, it would’ve become “one abduction too many” and official dereliction of duty, for allowing the harrowing incident to happen in the first place.
    So, President Muhammadu Buhari, and his government, deserves a pat on the back for not allowing “body language” to define his presidency, but demonstrating commitment to his sacred oath.
    Recall that a week earlier, armed bandits, which Boko Haram claimed were its foot-soldiers, seized the schoolboys from their boarding facilities at 11:30 p.m., and ferried them into the wild.
    It’s the second widely-publicised seizure of schoolchildren in two years on Buhari’s watch that rode to power in 2015, on the promise to rescue the 276 students of the Government Girls’ Secondary School (GGSS) in Chibok, Borno State, abducted in April 2014.
    That abduction gave birth to #BringBackOurGirls movement, and partly aborted the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) government of President Goodluck Jonathan that, in denial, took it weeks to acknowledge the tragedy, and failed to rescue the schoolgirls.
    Then retired Gen. Buhari-led opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) took advantage of that failure, and campaigned to free the schoolgirls if voted into power in the 2015 general election.
    Indeed, the new government formed by Buhari regained over 100 of the schoolgirls, leaving scores still in captivity. But the government had its litmus test in 2018 when Boko Haram abducted 110 students of the GGSS in Dapchi, Yobe State, with 104 returned, five died in transit, and one student, Leah Sharibu, still being held.
    The worry in the Kankara schoolboys’ abduction is the ease of the armed bandits’ operation, and escape on motorbikes barely hours after Buhari’s arrival in his hometown of Daura in the state.
    The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar III, on the heels of the Zabarmari farmers’ massacre in Borno State in November 2020, summed up the bandits’ audacious adventure in Kankara as “a slap on President Buhari’s face.”
    That categorisation is euphemistic, as the schoolboys’ abduction strikes at the ability and capability of the Buhari government to perform the most basic of its duties: To protect life and property.
    If the schoolboys – whose dishevelled appearances, while being conveyed from the captors’ den, brought tears to the eye – could be snatched at will, and “under President Buhari’s nose,” who’s free from the bandits and criminal elements roaming the country?
    Sa’ad Abubakar, head of the Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI), is the one asking the questions most Nigerians have sought answers to, as religious, tribal and commercial armed bandits occupy Nigeria.
    The posers, in a statement by the JNI Secretary-General, Dr. Khalid Abubakar Aliyu, which noted lapses in Nigeria’s security system that need urgent and serious attention, include the following:
    * How can one explain the movement of the bandits in their hundreds on motor cycles without being detected? * What happens to intelligence gathering that this heinous plan was not uncovered before it was hatched?
    * How comes the bandits took their time, gathered the schoolboys, heaped them on bikes and whisked them away without being rounded up by the security agencies?
    * Are the bandits this bold as to further test the resolve of the Government or smite the face of the Commander-in-Chief by bringing it up to his door step in his presence?
    * How long shall the masses continue to live in fear? * For how long shall the Federal and State Governments continue to issue empty condemnations whenever tragedies stroke?
    * Is the government and the security agencies so overwhelmed and thus cannot secure the citizens? * Are there insurmountable challenges or acts of sabotage that the Government is hiding from the public?
    * Is it that the political will isn’t there to locate the enemy’s actual enclave, the focal point of their strength and to devote all available means to rout them out or incapacitate them? * What really is the challenge or Nigerians don’t deserve to know from the government they elected?
    Sa’ad Abubakar’s “treatise” also touched on the implications of the abduction of schoolchildren, which’s to disrupt and/or stop Western education – the focal preachment of Boko Haram’s insurgency – that the abductors repeated on the fateful day.
    The Sultan’s words: “If there is any worse outcome than the abduction itself, it is the fact that this is the most potent action to frustrate school enrolment in Northern Nigeria.
    “As no parent will forthwith be comfortable to send their children or wards to boarding school despite the many enrolment campaign efforts by the Government.
    “And it will even be callous for anyone to call on the traumatised parents to expose their beloved children to these unprotected environments to be used as fodder by bandits and insurgents at will.”
    Another worry: The abductors reportedly asked the schoolboys, “Where are the girls?” Believing it’s an all-female school or a co-educational institution, their mission was to snatch the females for sex slaves, forced marriage or be deployed as suicide bombers.
    The Sultan referenced swirling “insinuations that for pecuniary benefits, some top echelon among the security operatives don’t want the insecurity to end.”
    He urged President Buhari to “listen to the calls from Nigerians to revamp the security architecture and address the nation,” and thus rest speculations of security involvement in crime and criminality.
    Referring to the abductions of schoolgirls in Chibok and Dapchi in Borno and Yobe, the Sultan said the Kankara schoolboys saga “is an indicator that the powers that be don’t read the present through the spectacle of the past.”
    Sultan Sa’ad Abubakar III has said it all: These times don’t call for circumlocution, equivocation or dancing about the subject of insecurity nationwide. It’s time to call a spade by its name.
    The Buhari government hasn’t significantly improved beyond its initial routing of the Boko Haram terrorists from their occupied local government areas in the North-East in 2015/2016.
    Despite official pontificating of “degrading” the insurgents, Boko Haram has merely splintered, but remains deadly, and penetrates the North-West under the cover of armed banditry.
    It’s time the Buhari administration did the right things: Rijig the security system. Devolve policing to States. Take security breaches serious, as it did in the Kankara abduction. Accept criticisms. Timely explain security happenings, to avoid speculations and spread of “fake news,” as hallmarked by #EndSARS protests. Strengthen the “Safe School Initiatives” with intelligence gathering.
    The government shouldn’t forget how it came to power: To protect life and property, which the Jonathan government failed to uphold in the seizure of 276 students of the GGSS in Chibok in April 2014.
    Thus, the PDP lacks the locus to incessantly call for Buhari’s resignation on grounds of “cluelessness and incompetence” of his administration – the exact charge, which the PDP exhibited in its 16-year reign that caused it the governance of the country it had boasted it would control for at least unbroken 60 years.
    * Mr. Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria.
  • Katsina abduction reminder of Dapchi, Chibok girls – Coalition

    Katsina abduction reminder of Dapchi, Chibok girls – Coalition

    The Coalition for Peace and National Security on Saturday criticised the attack on Government Science Secondary School, Kankara in Katsina State by bandits describing it as a sad reminder of the terrorists’ attacks on Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok in Borno State and Government Girls’ Science and Technical College, Dapchi, in Yobe State.

    While labeling the action of the bandits as unacceptable, the CPNS urged security agencies to immediately swing into action with a view to rescuing the missing students and apprehending the perpetrators.

    The CPNS which bared its mind in a statement by its national coordinator, Dr. Mohammed Maigoro and national secretary, Tunde Funsho, said the attack on school children was not only cowardly but also callous and a crime against humanity, prohibited under the international humanitarian law.

    The organization said with regret that the action of the bandits had totally affected Nigeria’s effort towards the enhancement of girl child education and development.

    The statement reads, “We received the news of the attack on Government Science Secondary School, Kankara in Katsina State, where at least 600 out of 800 students of the school are reportedly missing with shock.

    “This latest action by bandits is a sad reminder of the past similar ones on Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok in Borno State and Government Girls’ Science and Technical College, Dapchi, Yobe State that left some students dead and others missing.

    “This attack on innocent school children is not only cowardly but also callous and a crime against humanity, prohibited under the international humanitarian law.

    “We urge security agencies to immediately swing into action in not only rescuing the missing students but also apprehend the perpetrators of this heinous crime,”the group said.

    “This latest development is a yet another confirmation that the country is porous without security and given this bad situation, we wish to without any hesitation join the clarion call on our dear President, Muhammadu Buhari, to immediately rejig the nation’s security architecture beginning with the sack of service chiefs who apart from overstaying in office, have become exhausted to face the increasingly worsening security situation of our country”.

     

     

  • Dapchi: Coalition salutes Army’s gallantry in repelling Boko Haram

    The Coalition Against Terrorism and Extremism (CATE) has hailed the Nigerian Army for another display of gallantry in dislodging Boko Haram terrorists in Dapchi, Yobe State.

    The Air Task Force of Operation Lafiya Dole (OPLD) on Monday neutralised scores of terrorists on the outskirts of Dapchi Town, leaving over 32 dead and many others injured.

    The Coordinator, Defence Media Operations, Maj.-Gen. John Enenche, who confirmed this in a statement on Tuesday, said the airstrike also destroyed two terrorists’ gun trucks.

    In reaction through its National Coordinator, Gabriel Onoja, CATE said the feat buttresses the commitment of the troops in ensuring that the remnants of insurgents are wiped out for the return of peace and tranquillity to the North-East.

    According to the group, this remarkable turnaround is due to the leadership strides, patriotism and bravery of Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai who recently relocated to the Theatre of Operations.

    CATE equally praised officers and soldiers under Operation Lafiya Dole, who have aligned with the philosophy and vision of the COAS, displaying acts of bravery even in the face of challenges.

    However, the coalition urged the troops on the frontlines to sustain the tempo, adding that victory over the Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists is insight.

    While pledging to continue supporting the troops, CATE called on all Nigerians to do likewise.

  • Dapchi: Leah Sharibu must not die in Boko Haram’s custody, CAN warns FG

    The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) on Friday said the President Muhammadu Buhari led federal government must step up efforts to secure the release of the lone Christian girl, Leah Sharibu in Boko Haram’s custody.

    The religious body warned that there may be religious war in Nigeria should Leah die in the terrorist’s captivity.

    The Special Assistant (Media and Communications) to CAN President, Adebayo Oladeji, who spoke in an interview with The Punch said CAN would not stop to agitate for the release of the schoolgirl, adding that her death could spell doom for the country as she was being detained because of her religious inclination.

    Oladeji said, “Recently, CAN called out its members to demand for her release. We have addressed a press conference calling for her release. At every opportunity any church leader has to speak to the public, they demand her release.

    “We are doing a lot of things we cannot be disclosing to the public. Our concern includes the silence of the media and the civil society organisations thinking Leah Sharibu is a CAN affair. How many editorials have been written about her plight?

    He added, “CAN will not cease the agitation for the release of all the abductees, including Leah Sharibu. Let all and sundry rise up against the failure of the security agencies and ask President Muhammadu Buhari to wake up from his slumber before the terrorists and herdsmen finish the country.

    “Leah Sharibu must not die. Her death, God forbids, can spell doom for Nigeria. It can give an open invitation to religious war because Leah is being detained purely because of her religion.”

    Similarly, the Pentecostal Christian Association, which is the umbrella body that coordinates the activities of pentecostal, evangelical and charismatic ministries, churches and associations, described the country’s peace as hinged on Sharibu’s safety. Its National Publicity Secretary, Bishop Emmah Isong, said, “We can tell you that the peace of this country hangs on the Federal Government’s promise to secure the release of Leah Sharibu. She has become an ambassador of Christianity to the Republic of Boko Haram and we are demanding that she returns home safely to her parents.

    “All Nigerian youths are waiting to see what the Federal Government will do. Our constitution, which requires the government to be a protector of lives and property, will be called to question if Leah is not released. We do hope that with our prayers and the concern of all Nigerians, including Christians and Muslims, Leah would be released very soon by the grace of God.

    Recall that Sharibu was among the 111 girls abducted by Boko Haram on February 19 in Dapchi, Yobe State. The insurgents had since returned 105 of the girls, but refused to release Leah on the ground that she refused to renounce her Christian faith, while five of the girls were said to have died.

    The Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, had on Wednesday said efforts were on to ensure the release of Sharibu, noting that she would not be abandoned by the Federal Government.

  • Dapchi: Christian girl, Leah Sharibu clocks 16 in Boko Haram’s captivity

    …as parents call for prayers for her release

    The parents of Leah Sharibu, the only Dapchi girl still being held by Boko Haram terrorists have called on Nigerians to pray for her safe return as she marks her 16th birthday on Monday (today).

    Mrs. Rebecca Sharibu while speaking with newsmen on Sunday said they (parents) would fast and pray on Monday (today), adding that Nigerians should join them in offering special prayers for her safety and timely return.

    “Tomorrow, Monday, May 14, 2018, (today) our daughter, Miss Leah Sharibu, will be 16 years. If she were here with us, we would have been celebrating her 16th birthday with her.

    “She is not with us and all we can do is fast and pray for her as a family and I want to appeal to all Nigerians and other concerned people around the world to help us pray for her safety wherever she is and for her return as well.

    “President Buhari has seemed to have forgotten about Leah but we know God who brought her forth will not forget her. We believe that God is keeping watch over her and our prayers would be answered,” she said.

    Mrs. Sharibu, who lamented the delay in negotiating the release of Leah when the 105 of the girls were returned within a record time, accused President Buhari of not doing enough in the case of Leah.

    “The President promised us that Leah would be released, but we wonder why it is taking him too long to facilitate her release as was the case in the release of the other 105 Dapchi girls.

    “Mr. President knows the channel he used to secure the release of the other girls and he cannot tell us that he doesn’t know how to get Leah back to us. But it seems he has left us and Leah to our fate. No one is talking to us about her issue, not even the state government,” she lamented.

    The parents, who thanked the international community, religious groups and notable Nigerians for their solidarity, called for sustained pressure on the Federal Government to ensure the release of Leah and other girls still in Boko Haram captivity.

    Meanwhile, the parents of the released Dapchi schoolgirls will on Tuesday (tomorrow) hold a world press conference in Damaturu, the Yobe State capital, to press for the release of Leah Sharibu.

    The Secretary of the Dapchi Parents’ Association, Mallam Bukar Kachalla, said this in a telephone interview with our correspondent on Sunday.

    Kachalla said apart from prayers, the world would know about the poor handling of Leah and the released Dapchi schoolgirls’ issue by the state and federal governments.

    “We are going to tell the world our position about the government’s poor handling of Leah’s case on Tuesday at a world press conference in Damaturu.

    “We were in Chibok recently to mark the anniversary of the abduction of their girls and we have collectively resolved to continue putting pressure on the Federal Government until the girls are all released.

    “It’s unfortunate that even the state government has not deemed it expedient to pay us a condolence visit over the death of five of the girls let alone providing psychological support to the girls, most of whom came back traumatised,” he said.

    The secretary also said that the United Nations Children’s Fund had sponsored 20 of the released Dapchi schoolgirls to continue their studies at the Turkish International School, Mamudo in Yobe State, calling on other organisations and public-spirited individuals to help sponsor more of the girls who had vowed not to return to the GGSTC, Dapchi.

    Leah Sharibu was abducted alongside other 109 girls of the Government Girls Science and Technical College, Dapchi in Yobe State on February 19, 2018, and was not among the 104 girls that were released later by Boko Haram for allegedly refusing to renounce her Christian faith.

  • Remarks by Trump, Buhari before bilateral meeting

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much. It’s an honor to be with President Buhari of Nigeria. We have many things that we do together, as you know, probably — especially on terrorism and terrorism-related.

    We also have a very big trade deal that we’re working on for military equipment — helicopters and the like. We have met before. We have developed a great relationship. And we look forward to our discussion today — very important — but again, especially as it relates to terrorism. And that’s terrorism here and terrorism all over the world. It’s a hotbed, and we’re going to be stopping that.

    Also, we’ve had very serious problems with Christians who have been murdered, killed in Nigeria. We’re going to be working on that problem, and working on that problem very, very hard, because we can’t allow that to happen.

    Mr. President, thank you very much for being here. Thank you.

    PRESIDENT BUHARI: Thank you, Mr. President, very much for inviting me. It’s a great honor. I’m very grateful for it.

    Sadly, security is the main issue. We very grateful to the United States for agreeing to give us the aircraft we asked for — the spare parts. We are even more grateful for the physical presence of the United States military (inaudible) that are going to our institutions in Nigeria, and train them and go to the front, in the northeast, to see how they are performing, as an example of the training given to them.

    So the commitment of the United States to get rid of terrorism across the world, we have firsthand experience of that, and we are very grateful for it.

    The problem about the (inaudible) and jihadists in Nigeria is a very long, historical thing. But the state is most concerned — they know that the Nigerian jihadists never carry anything more than a stick, and occasionally a machete, to cut down foliage and give it to the (inaudible) and carrying AK-47s.

    So I don’t think people should underrate what happened in Libya: Forty-three years of Qaddafi. People were recruited from the Sahel; they were caught — and nothing other than shoot and killed.

    With the demise of Qaddafi, they moved to their countries, into their regions, and they carried away with them the only experience they have — trained using weapons. And that’s what is aggravating the situation.

    We are doing our best to make sure we have stopped the cross-border and so on, and — to get the weapons from the (inaudible) and weapons in the region checked. But it’s going to take time, and the action by the United States in trying to see the end of ISIS has helped us a lot. Because Boko Haram in Nigeria at one time made a statement that they are loyal to ISIS.

    Now that ISIS have virtually gone with the help of the United States, we are very grateful for that. And we are sure that we are still (inaudible) the situation and the security in Nigeria.

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: We have very much decimated ISIS. Much has taken place over the last 12 months. But Boko Haram has been terrible. And how did you do with the young women that were kidnapped? How is that going?

    PRESIDENT BUHARI: The Chibok girls and the Dapchi one — the Chibok one was before we came — 2014. But only a number of them — we recovered about 80 of them. But the Dapchi one, there were 106 that were kidnapped. We got 100 back. Four died; one is still held in captivity. And we are very grateful to the United Nations organization that is acting as (inaudible) between us and the kidnappers. And we haven’t given up. We are trying to get everybody back to join their families and their schools.

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: A terrible problem. Mr. President, thank you very much, everybody.

    PRESIDENT BUHARI: Thank you very much.

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much everybody.

    Q Are you working on a deal on immigration?

    PRESIDENT TRUMP: Yeah.

     

  • Chibok, Dapchi Girls abduction: ActionAid Nigeria calls for safe cities, spaces in schools

    ActionAid Nigeria (AAN) has called on the Federal Government to make the cities and spaces in schools more safe to avoid a repeat of the horrible experiences of the Chibok and more recently the Dapchi girls’ abduction saga which shook the entire nation.

    The group said this in a statement to mark the fourth year remembrance of the Chibok girls’ kidnap which took place in April 2014.

    The statement reads: “ActionAid Nigeria (AAN) continues to stand in solidarity with the families, friends and the entire community of the kidnapped Chibok girls, who in the last four years have endured the agony of missing their loved ones.

    The Country Director of AAN Ene Obi say, ‘‘While we commend the efforts of the Federal Government and the Nigeria military for securing the release of some of these kidnapped girls. However, today we remember the 113 girls that are yet to be rescued and we join our voice with their families, friends in Nigeria and the international community to call on the Nigerian government to intensify effort to bring back the girls.’’

    She added that ‘‘the abduction of the Dapchi girls’ although now released has further heightened the vulnerability of the Nigerian girl-child, both in conflict and non-conflict zones. Hence, government at all levels must prioritise safe cities, provision of security and safe spaces in our schools in order to encourage girls’ enrolment and retention as well as protect them from all forms of violence.

    Ene concluded that ‘‘the Federal Government and the Nigeria military should adopt its intelligence, power and negotiation as deployed for the release of the Dapchi girls, to bring back the remaining 113 missing Chibok girls and 1 Dapchi girl, Leah Shuaibu.’’

     

  • Dapchi Christian girl: Archbishop of Canterbury offers to contribute to negotiations

    After weeks Dapchi Christian girl, Leah Sharibu, has remained in lone captivity, and as Nigeria continues to battle Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen menaces, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has repeated his offer to contribute towards peace negotiations in the country.

    The Archbishop of Canterbury, following his January’s tweet, reiterated his offer to contribute towards any peace negotiations while fielding questions on the deteriorating security situation in Nigeria put to the British government in the House of Lords on Monday.

    “I once again exhort President Muhammadu Buhari and other authorities, civil and religious, national and international, urgently to build a coalition to end this violence immediately.

    “In communications earlier this year with the Primate of All Nigeria, His Grace Nicholas Okoh, I offered to contribute towards such effort to the extent such might be useful. I repeat that offer again, knowing, however, that within Nigeria are all the skills needed for resolution of the suffering of the people.

    “My condolences go to those who have lost loved ones and property. I urge the authorities to seek for ways to ameliorate their sufferings and losses. I call on all people of goodwill to continue to pray for the peace of Nigeria,” Archbishop Justin said.

    TheNewsGuru reports President Buhari had assured the parent of the lone girl in Boko Haram’s captivity and the entire Dapchi community that he won’t abandon her because of her bravery not denounce her religion.

    However, weeks after, Leah Sharibu is still in captivity; even after the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Ibrahim Idris, confirmed that the Boko Haram terrorists were set to release her.

    Meanwhile, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) had called on all churches and Christians to use the occasion of Easter to offer prayers to God for Leah Sharibu’s freedom and safe return.

    Others, including the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) and the General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye, have appealed for the safe return of Leah Sharibu.