CHIBOK GIRLS SAGA: Making Political Gains of Miseries of the Innocents

The issue of the Chibok girls is a clear example of how Satan and his hordes afflict mankind and turn issues upside down to confuse the undiscerning and the naive.  The enemy strikes out in plain sight, but nevertheless attempts to write the scripts for what our response must be!  Strangely, people uncritically swallow the yarns, and soon stupidly enough begin to regurgitate it. It is the central blueprint of the enemy for the endtime as we have been pointing out for nearly two decades - create the problem and force the world to accept the solution you proffer.

Like we wrote on the issue of Ebola, it is not politically correct to ask about the origin of the indisputably man-made virus  (Or the motivations and sponsors of American-Liberian, Mr Patrick Sawyerr who desperately brought it to Nigeria.) The urgent matter of the moment must be to find a cure – whatever that cure demands.  Thank God for His manifest help in helping us kick ebola out of Nigeria, thus providing a huge reprieve for the entire world. 

In the same vein on Chibok, no one seems interested again in the details of why Moslem government/school officials known to have sympathies for Boko Haram insisted on overruling the clear warning of the West African Examination Council that it was not advisable to go ahead to conduct the exam at Chibok, a predominantly Christian area in insurgency-prone Borno state.  Rather than address the important issues raised by the First Lady in her investigative intervention, the opposition party managed to reduce the entire proceedings to two comical phrases: “Na only you waka come?” And “Dia is God o”.

And quite incredibly and bewildering, supposedly educated Nigerians are laughing!

Despite General Mohammed Buhari’s clear statements that the War on Boko Haram amounts to a war on Northern Nigeria, and so on and so forth; members of the opposition still have the guts  to reduce the current elections to one and only one issue – insecurity in North-Eastern Nigeria!  And guess what, they insist that government carries every iota of the blame.

One does not have to be a security expert to appreciate the challenges involved in planning a rescue mission for over 200 girls from multiple enclaves of merciless psychopathic/brain-washed killers, many of whom would include female suicide bombers which can’t be distinguished from the victims to be rescued!.  Even in hostage situations where the victims were in one well-defined facility whose detailed plans were available to government, paratroopers backed with cutting edge science and technology could not succeed in effecting a 100% rescue.  A ready example was that in the Moscow theatre in 2002. One hundred and thirty of the 850 hostages died in that operation  – and it was accepted by the whole world as a successful rescue operation.  Virtually all the rescue attempts in recent times by the almighty United States have resulted in the victims dying in the attempt! Other countries like France could only docilely watch their kidnapped citizens brutally beheaded by ISIS in captivity.  There are clearly  limits to what magic military interventions can perform.

Imagine what would happen were forty, not to talk of about 100 of the girls (which is quite possible) to be killed in a rescue attempt!  Unfortunately for the Jonathan administration, it went to press too early announcing impending ceasefire with Boko Haram and release of the girls – negotiated by Chadian authorities. (In a comment made during the Convocation Lecture of the Redeemers University last month, eminent historian Prof Jide Osuntokun averred that 70% of Boko Haram fighters are Chadians).  The political sponsors of Boko Haram merely upped the ante, and ensured the deal was frustrated.

In all of these, 219 innocent girls continue to live in the midst of heartless beasts. Whereas most of the commentaries and publicity on the issue have become to gain political capital - whether it be from the Obamas in America, to the attention-seeking group in Abuja, it is very refreshing reading the recent commentary from Kechie’s project, posted below:

Chibok girls of Nigeria: Whose girls are they?

Nkechi Ogbodo | 2/12/2015, 9:18 a.m.

“There is no national consensus in Nigeria on how to deal with the Boko Haram insurgency. What outsiders often fail to grasp is that this grim situation is merely the symptom of a deeper malaise: a breakdown of the informal consensus on power sharing between the Muslim north and the Christian south that had guided Nigerian politics for decades.”—Princeton Lyman, former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria. 

I agree with the ambassador’s assessment.

Friends, it seems like only yesterday that Kechie’s Project organized a rally, forum, vigil, concert and media reception in solidarity with our Chibok girls. We stood in solidarity in front of the Nigerian Consulate May 10, 2014, with the support of Harlem4 Center for Change and Street Corner Resources and demanded the return of the Chibok girls. We stood in solidarity with the Chibok girls, along with progressive Nigerians, friends of Nigeria, Christians, Jews, Catholics, secularists and Muslims and demanded the return of the Chibok girls by Boko Haram at a time when demanding action in front of our consulate was still not politically correct. We called on President Goodluck Jonathan to do all within his power to secure the release of the girls. We did that as Nigerians and friends of Nigeria looking for the new Nigerian Renaissance as Nigerians who want a better Nigeria.

On a personal note, I was doing it because I know what it means to have a loved one kidnapped. I was doing it because standing up for Chibok was a way to give a voice to my mother, who was a victim of ransom kidnapping in Nigeria, enduring eight weeks in captivity. I was standing and raising my voice because each time I see my mother, I see an old woman who was violated and who is still in pain both emotionally and physically. So when I stood up for Chibok, I was standing up for the parents and families of all who were kidnapped. We were standing up for all Nigerian girls, regardless of what part of Nigeria they are from. We were doing it for all Nigerian girls. We stood up for Chibok and spent resources, because since 2010, Kechie’s Project has been about empowerment of girls through education.

What I thought to be the new Nigerian Renaissance, unfortunately, was hijacked by a select few who continue to dwarf the progress of Nigeria. All of a sudden, the Bring Back Our Girls campaign became a movement that was commandeered and used by the opposition as a tool for political gains. The world watched as the momentum we all built to state the case for our girls got replaced by ethnic and religious rancor. Elections and real issues facing Nigerians became filtered with hatred, even among the so-called educated elites. Our girls got pushed to the sidelines, and the demonization of political opponents became the order of the day. The world turned away because Nigerians are their own worst enemies.

Read the rest at http://www.kechiesproject.org/kechie-s-notes.html

 

Here is how Nkechi concluded  the article:

“Yes, there are many reasons not to vote for Jonathan, but Buhari is not the answer for my freedom of speech and for my respect as a woman. Buhari is not the answer for the empowerment of women, both politically and socially. He is definitely not the answer for all our girls and our daughters, including those in the northern part of Nigeria who are being married off as children, or for all my fellow Nigerians.

PDP and APC are both the same. APC is an old wine in a new bottle. Both parties have offered ordinary Nigerians nothing but misery. Our focus should be on how to work together as one nation, with one voice toward finding a visionary leader who will embrace our rich diversity and enhance the quality of life for all Nigerians.

Nkechi Ogbodo is president and founder of Kechie’s Project. For more information, contact info@kechiesproject.org or visit www.kechiesproject.org.