The Minister for Women’s Affairs and Social Development, Senator Aisha Alhassan has urged leaders of the parents of the missing Chibok school girls in Chibok and Abuja, alongside the leader of the Chibok community in Abuja to remain united as the federal government continues its task toward ensuring the return of their daughters still in captivity.
The Minister made the plea on Friday as she mediated a discordance among the parties at the ministry’s headquarters in Abuja.
In a transparent move, Alhassan narrated her shock at encountering a faction of the parents group led by Reverend Mark Enoch at the Aso Villa on Wednesday, April 19, where he (Enoch) stated that they wanted information about their daughters from the President.
Enoch who has 2 daughters still in captivity lamented that since his relocation from Chibok to Abuja the current chairman of the parents group, YakubuNkeki, had failed to keep him and other parents in Abuja updated.
The minister in her response stressed, “ There is nothing that happens that I do not inform the leadership of the parents,” detailing that she had briefed Nkeki two weeks prior to April 14, 2017 which marked three years since the girls were abducted on updates of government efforts and the rehabilitation exercise of the rescued girls. She however said that if they were unhappy with their representation, to change it as they saw fit.
The chairman Nkeki decried allegations of withholding information but admitted to sidelining information in the interest of the parents as he had believed it to either be security sensitive or capable of raising false hopes.
The minister further informed the parents that security intelligence gathered had revealed that the insurgents where constantly on the move, with abducted individuals often used as human shields. For this she underscored Nkeki’s decision to sideline information which may have, at the time, hindered rescue efforts.
However the Senator stated that hence forth she would endeavour to ensure that affected parents resident in Abuja and out received available updates, and stressed that the government’s drive to rescue the girls alive had not waned.
“The government is trying its best. At least it is when this government came that we starting getting the girls back,” Alhassan said.
In a related issue, following the request of the chairman of the Chibok community in Abuja, Tsambido Hosea Ababa, that he too be informed of any updates, the minister sounded a stern position, stressing that under the mandate of the ministry, she would only be in contact with the parents involved. For this she reiterated that it was imperative that in light of their grief, that they remain steadfast in prayers and with ‘one voice’ until the government had done its part at ensuring their daughters return safely.