Politics
Chibok: The Blame Game
For the past three weeks or
thereabout, many Nigerians have lost patience with the Jonathan administration as a result of the April 14 bomb blasts that occurred in Nyanya which left scores of their compatriots dead and many more injured, as well as the abduction of over 200 school girls who were sitting for West African School Certificate (WASC) examinations at Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, in Borno State.
President Jonathan unwittingly exacerbated the mood of the nation when he attended a rally organized by his party, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Kano, where he treated the world to scintillating presidential dance-steps, barely twenty-four hours after the mindless killing and abduction of his hapless subjects.
Consequently, there have been accusations and counter-accusations over the security challenges facing the country occasioned by the activities of the Boko Haram sect. The National Women leader of the PDP, Kema Chikwe and the leader of Niger Delta Volunteer Force, Asari Dokubo, publicly expressed disbelief that the female students were kidnapped, given the fact that Borno State along with Yobe and Adamawa States are in state of emergency.
Dokubo went further to challenge the Borno State government and the school authorities to publish the names and photographs of the abducted students.
However, on Friday, May 2, the First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan convened a stakeholders’ meeting to assist the Borno State government and the parents of the abducted girls in addressing their plight. The meeting which was re-scheduled for Sunday, May 4 drew tears from the eyes of Mama Peace as the First Lady is fondly called, when she discovered to her chagrin that the wife of the Borno State governor, Hajiya Nana Shettima and parents of the missing girls were absent.
According to her, before the kidnapping and killings started in Borno, she assured the wife of the governor of her support but she was surprised that after such incident, Mrs Shettima did not come to see her.
“After the incident, I waited for her, she did not come. I sent for her, she came. I asked questions, no answer. I asked her to come with the principal and parents. She did not turn up till today. To our greatest surprise, she sent a commissioner.
“The next thing I saw was women demonstrating. No woman will fold her hands while her house is on fire. She is the mother of Borno. She is the mother of these children. I am their grandmother. She should be more concerned and come to her grandma.
“The Police, Army, WAEC, government officials came with a few of their own but no parent was present to tell us their child was kidnapped or among those who escaped.
“I don’t want anybody to reply or abuse me on the pages of newspaper. It is because we are pained and crying that is why I am doing so.
“Why should I cry more than the bereaved? The world will ask me question if I do. If after today Borno people say we should not help them, don’t go to the street to demonstrate.
“You are playing games. Don’t use school children and women for demonstration again. Keep it to Borno. Let it end there until you people are ready to co-operate”, she said.
The Head of National office of WAEC, Mr Charles Eguridu also spoke on this matter. He said, “I wrote to the Minister of Education to ask for the relocation of students to sit for their examinations in the state capitals, in safe location.
“The Minister in turn wrote to the three governors but none of them responded. Then I directed my Zonal Coordinator in Borno in particular to liaise with the Ministry of Education in that state.
“The response they got was so disheartening; they were told that they had security in place for the candidates and that we should come and conduct the examinations in the schools.
“They also said that they were not ready to relocate their students from Chibok and indeed other areas to Maiduguri or nearby locations, where security agencies could provide security.”
The Borno Elders Forum (BEF), an umbrella body of elders in the state, condemned the statement credited to the First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan that Governor Kashim Shettima, being the chief security officer of the state, should be held responsible for the abduction of Chibok school girls.
The spokesman of the group, Bulama Mali Gabio in a statement said the First Lady spoke out of ignorance.
According to him, since Borno was under a state of emergency, where powers of control over security have been withdrawn from the governor and vested in the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, governor exercises little or no control on security matters in such circumstance.
“We have listened to the very disturbing remarks of our First Lady, saying Governor Kashim Shettima should be held responsible as he is the chief security officer of Borno State.
“It is very important we remind her that the emergency declared by her dear husband, Mr President is still in force and this means the constitutional powers of the governor as chief security officer have been temporarily withdrawn by the President in accordance with section 305 of the constitution which the President relied upon.
“The President as chief security officer of Borno exercises his powers through his appointees, the Chief of Defence Staff, Chief of Army Staff or any of the service chiefs, and the governor administers other aspects of governance that fall under concurrent legislative list of the constitution.
“It is very ridiculous that the First Lady threatened to lead women to protest at the Government House in Maiduguri when her husband is still the Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces with the provision of security directly vested in the Federal Government that he leads.
“If the First Lady of the nation absolves the President of blames and leads protests to the Governor of Borno, should the governor’s wife also lead protest to the chairman of Chibok Local Government Area as the one to be blamed? Should the wife of the chairman also lead protest to the principal of the school as the one to be blamed and possibly the principal’s wife or husband lead protest to the gateman at the school as the person to be blamed? This is funny indeed.
“The First Lady should grow to be the mother of the country and not to be seen doing things that can best be seen as unpresidential and capable of causing unnecessary confusion in the land at a time that the country desires leadership from her husband,” the statement said.
In an interview on CNN last Tuesday, the Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka said that the government of President Goodluck Jonathan was not capable of countering the menace of the violent Islamic sect, Boko Haram.
“This menace has to be internationalized. Every country has to be involved in finding solutions to the problem. It is not a Nigerian problem but the problem of the whole world. From the activities of the group and the response of the government since the madness started, it is clear that the government cannot handle this problem alone”, he said.
Soyinka accused both the past and present governments in the country of living in self-denial, by believing that they could negotiate or appeal to murderers and killers to stop their activities.
“It is not just the President that has been living in self-denial but some of those he has surrounded himself with. I cannot understand why it is difficult to ask for international help when you are confronted with a problem of this nature.
“This problem would not have reached this monstrous level if the President has not been living in self-denial. So, accepting the help of the United States in this matter is long over-due.
“The politicians helped to entrench this problem in the first place. The large army of Almajiri metamorphosed into the raw materials that those terrorists recruited and politicians also used them for their own selfish interest. Now, they can no longer handle the problem”, he said.
Also disappointed with the handling of the abducted school girls by the Federal Government, United States former First Lady US former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, said last Wednesday night in New York that the Nigerian government had shown irresponsibility in matters relating to girls and boys over the years.
“The government of Nigeria has been, in my view, somewhat derelict in its responsibility for protecting boys and girls, men and women”, she said.
She described the action of the terrorist group as “abominable, criminal, an art of terrorism” which required the “fullest response possible first and foremost from the government of Nigeria”.
A reowned preachers of the Christian gospel, Prophet T.B. Joshua of the Synagogue, Church of All Nations also comented on the abduction of the Chibok girls in his sermon last Sunday.
According to him, “Nigeria is calm, it is the political parties that are not calm. The political parties gave birth to militants and Boko Haram.
“How can over 200 school girls be kidnapped some where and we are talking about disagreement between political parties. And APC and PDP are not ashamed?
They should suspend all rallies and acrimonious campaigns. It is the division that gave opportunity for hoodlums, militants and Boko Haram to explore and exploit.
“If our political class does not stop their campaigns and rallies and put aside the names of the parties – APC , PDP, Labour – to come together to discuss as Nigerians, those people will turn against them. Any moment from now, you will hear big shots being attacked.
He assured the parents of the missing schoolgirls that their children would be rescued, saying they should not be misled by spurious news reports.
“Get ready to receive your children back. Your children are coming home”, he said.
Reward Akwu
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has begun deploying non-sensitive materials to the zones as it prepares for the 2027 general election.
Acting Chairman of the commission, Prof. Rhoda Gumus, disclosed this in Abuja, yesterday at a bench-marking meeting with a delegation of Kenya’s Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC).
“Right now, all non-sensitive materials are almost ready. In fact, today as we speak here, the non-sensitive materials have been lifted to some zones now,” Gumus said.
She said the commission had completed nine of its scheduled activities and was preparing for the next phase.
“We are preparing for the election next year and we have activities lined up. So far, we have been able to complete nine activities and we are still preparing for the next level of activities,” she said.
Gumus said the commission’s leadership had just concluded a tour of the country’s six zones to assess their level of preparedness.
“The purpose was to go round the zones to see how prepared we are, assess what the zones have put in place, their challenges and what to do. We concluded last week and we can see from our tour that we are really going towards the election proper,” she said.
On Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs), the acting chairman said production had been completed and distribution to the states was well advanced.
“As of today, we can say that PVCs have been produced and the first, second batches, most of the states have received them. Their PVC collection is ongoing. All those who are supposed to be the voters are supposed to receive their PVCs, and if they don’t have them, it is also another challenge,” Gumus said.
She added that capacity building was under way for staff at the headquarters and in the states, and that the procurement and deployment of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System BVAS devices were also ongoing.
On diaspora voting, Gumus said the commission could not proceed for now because the law did not provide for it.
“Here, because we go by the law, in our electoral law, it is not included there, so we cannot go on for the diaspora voting for now until we amend the electoral law,” she said.
The acting chairman said the commission had arranged for its directors to hold an interactive session with the Kenyan team and present papers on the work of their departments.
Leading the delegation, the Kenyan High Commissioner to Nigeria, Isaac Parashina, said the IEBC team was in Nigeria to benchmark ahead of Kenya’s general election in August 2027.
He said the team was studying how Nigeria handled its diaspora population and special voting groups, as Kenya sought to widen voting rights for citizens living abroad.
“Currently we have about 12 of them who voted in the last general election, but there is intention to expand to around, I think, 26,” Parashina said, referring to the countries where Kenyans abroad vote.
He said the expansion was a constitutional requirement backed by Kenyan court rulings, and would be enforced progressively.
Parashina said Nigeria’s election, which he noted would come in two rounds, would be closely watched across Africa.
“Everyone is looking at what Nigeria will do because it is the biggest democracy in Africa. The success of Nigeria remains a great success to Kenya and indeed to the continent,” he added.
The High Commissioner thanked INEC for receiving the team despite a tight schedule and wished the commission success.
Governor Douye Diri has set a target of at least one million votes for President Bola Tinubu in Bayelsa State in the 2027 presidential election, while charging the newly inaugurated All Progressives Congress (APC) State Campaign Council to prioritise reconciliation, party unity and collective electoral mobilisation.
Governor Diri gave the charge at the inauguration of the 20-member campaign council at the APC secretariat in Yenagoa, where he warned that internal divisions could undermine the party’s efforts to secure victory for President Tinubu and other candidates at the federal and state levels.
Governor Diri urged party members who were not appointed to the council to support its activities by taking the APC’s message to communities, wards and polling units across the state.
He specifically charged the campaign team to mobilise at least one million votes for President Tinubu, arguing that Bayelsa’s voting strength had increased and should be reflected in the 2027 election results.
“I give you a target that in Bayelsa, we must not bring less than one million votes for Mr President. You are going to campaign, and you have a lot to talk about the President. He has done so much for our people,” the governor said.
He listed the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, the second phase of the Nembe-Brass Road, interventions in the power sector, federal appointments for Bayelsa indigenes and the establishment of the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy among the achievements the campaign should present to voters.
The governor particularly praised President Tinubu for the coastal highway project, arguing that it reflected federal attention to the development needs of coastal communities.
“No president, alive or dead, has remembered the coastal people and coastal states to say let us do this signature project from Lagos to Calabar. The first president to think about it is Bola Tinubu, and those were the demands of the Ijaw people,” he said.
Governor Diri also expressed hope that a second term for President Tinubu would provide an opportunity to advance demands for fiscal federalism, greater resource control and state policing, which he described as longstanding aspirations of the Niger Delta.
He said the President had shown indications of addressing some of the demands of younger Nigerians and argued that re-election would allow the administration to consolidate its reforms.
The governor further cautioned campaigners against personal attacks and abusive exchanges with political opponents, insisting that the APC should focus its campaign on issues, policies and achievements.
The governor’s mobilisation directive comes amid criticism from the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which has questioned his commitment to President Tinubu’s re-election campaign, alleging that APC campaign billboards erected across Yenagoa promote other party candidates without featuring the President.
The PDP, through its Publicity Secretary, Mr Ikaebimo Mark, said the billboards showed Governor Diri urging voters to support APC candidates for the National Assembly and State House of Assembly elections without identifying President Tinubu as the party’s presidential candidate.
Mr Mark described the omission as an indication that the governor was not fully aligned with the APC’s national leadership.
“When we said that the governor, Senator Douye Diri, is not supporting President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, we knew exactly what we were saying. Now Governor Douye Diri has erected APC campaign billboards across Bayelsa State without Tinubu’s picture. He is even afraid to associate himself with the photograph of the presidential candidate of his own party. How can this governor claim to be supporting President Tinubu?” he said.
The PDP, however, maintained that the governor’s public campaign posture raised questions about his commitment to the President’s re-election bid. Its allegation over the billboards now places the issue of the relationship between the state APC leadership and the party’s national campaign among the political questions likely to feature in Bayelsa’s preparations for 2027.
The PDP’s allegation has introduced a fresh political dimension to the APC’s preparations in Bayelsa, even as Governor Diri publicly called on party leaders and members to close ranks and mobilise support for all its candidates.
“Every person picked as a member of this campaign council was carefully scrutinised. I want to tell you that our campaign team is loaded. We parade the best candidates among all the parties in Bayelsa State, and there is no doubt about that,” he said.
He urged members to remain focused and united, warning that political opponents could exploit any divisions within the party.
“Our unity is very important because they would want to feast on our disunity. We will not give them that opportunity. Please, as you carry out this assignment, do not take your eyes off the target,” Hon. Ogoriba said.
SP Edafe explained that during the meeting, the organisers were briefed on the identified security threats and advised against embarking on an open-road procession.
Instead, the police reportedly recommended that the political activities be conducted at a designated venue where adequate security arrangements could be provided.
However, the Command alleged that the organisers disregarded the security advice and proceeded with the road procession.
Meanwhile, the Delta State Government has condemned the political violence that erupted in Asaba, the state capital, on Saturday, confirming that one person was killed while four others sustained serious injuries.
The government described the incident as unfortunate and unacceptable, warning political parties and their supporters against actions capable of threatening public peace, security and democratic participation in the state.
In a statement issued by the Commissioner for Works (Rural Roads) and Public Information, Mr Charles Aniagwu, the government reiterated its zero tolerance for political violence, intimidation and other forms of political misconduct.
Mr Aniagwu said the government had repeatedly cautioned political parties against engaging in activities capable of disrupting the peace, insisting that the incident could have been avoided if the organisers had followed security advice.
According to him, the police had advised the organisers to cancel the proposed street march and instead conduct their political campaign at a designated venue where adequate security arrangements could be provided.
He expressed concern that the advice was allegedly disregarded, resulting in a confrontation that claimed one life and left four other people seriously injured.
The government subsequently called on the police to conduct a thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding the violence and ensure that anyone found culpable is brought to justice.
Mr Aniagwu further warned that the state government would not tolerate politically motivated attacks against any individual, regardless of political affiliation.
He maintained that Delta State remained safe for residents and visitors, stressing that the government would not allow the actions of individuals or groups to undermine the prevailing peace and security in the state.
The government also urged political parties, their leaders and supporters to conduct their political activities within the confines of the law and demonstrate respect for human life, public order and the rights of other citizens.
The latest development follows an attack on supporters of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) during a political procession in Asaba, which reportedly left several participants injured and campaign vehicles vandalised.
The government’s condemnation comes amid growing concerns over political violence and the safety of opposition supporters as political activities intensify ahead of the 2027 general elections.
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