Abduction of school girls: Jonathan urges parents to cooperate with government

Posted by African Examiner Featured, Latest Headlines Sunday, May 4th, 2014

Kayode Adelowokan

President Goodluck Jonathan has appealed to parents and guidance of the 234 abducted school girls in Chibok, Borno State of the country to cooperate with the presidential committee set up to know the identity of the school girls and their quick rescue.

Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan

President Jonathan, who made the appeal during a presidential media chat on national television on Sunday said that government is trying its best to ensure that the school girls return to their respective homes.

“There is need for parents and guidance of the school girls to cooperate with government and come up with an identity of their wards at least their photographs of the girls so as to help government in its search for the girls”, the President said.

He urged the parents to disregard any religious barriers that may exit but relate with the committee. “Let the parents come out to help us.”

On the state of emergency in some parts of the Northern states, President Goodluck Jonathan said that he was consulting on the possibility of extending the state of emergency in the Borno, Yobe and Adamawa State adding that the emergency rule was effective in containing insurgency contrary to claims in certain quarters.

He maintained that the reason behind the state of emergency rule was not to collapse the political structures nor remove the sitting state governors and the legislatures.

He added that the emergency rule was not intended to launch a full scale war in the affected states because, according to him ”there must be rules of engagement”.

President Jonathan stressed that the emergency rule had helped to facilitate search for illegal weapons and protect security agents against abusing human right laws, adding that those who were against its extension took the position out of frustration that terrorism had not stopped in the affected states since its declaration.

The president explained that the security agencies had done creditably in fighting terrorism. He further said that terrorism ‘is not getting worse in the country’ because the security agencies had helped to curtail its frequency compared to when it started.

He however decried the condemnation of security personnel, stating that they needed to be better equipped and timely informed to aid their operations.

The President said Nigeria’s security agencies were capable of curtailing insurgency and that government was working hard to equip and improve their capacity.

“I have just approved the request for recruitment of more personnel and building capacity,” he said.

Jonathan said government was taking steps to address the challenge of illegal immigrants who were alleged to be behind terrorism in the country.

He said government was being careful in order not to go against the ECOWAS Convention on Free Movement of Persons and goods and other related international conventions.