Dapchi Girls: Bring Back Our Girls II

The ill fated school were the girls were abducted.

Anguish and fear trail the news that some one hundred and ten female students from a secondary school in Dapchi, Yobe state are missing following an attack on the Government Girls Science and Technology College allegedly carried out by the dreaded Boko Haram sect. Info rm
ation minister, Lai Muhammed disclose this in a statement on Sunday. This is coming barely four years to the day, some two hundred girls from a school in Chibok, Bornu state were abducted.

According to Yobe State Governor, Boko Haram invaded the school shortly after the military check point in the area was mysteriously dismantled and the soldiers, ordered back to base. Why there were withdrawn, we may never know. However the military's defence that there was never a checkpoint in the area is also laughable. How could an area under threat for so long be left unguarded and it’s people unprotected? What does it say of the billions of Naira dolled out in the name of the fight against insurgency ? This makes it the second time in succession that Nigeria’s security agencies have been accused of complicity in attacks against Nigerians.

After the sad event that led to the Chibok school girls abduction, many would have thought that the Nigerian government elected mainly because it promised to tackle insecurity and corruption , should have put measures in place to prevent any reoccurrence. In a zone, still being targeted by the Islamic insurgents, it is strange and difficult to understand how schools, especially a female only school would be left unguarded and exposed in a war area. We seem incapable of learning from our mistakes.

Sadly, the Nigerian government overtime have not learnt their lessons. They prefer to be reactive rather than proactive. Security of life and property is the basic function if any government. The Nigerian Military has time and again claimed dominance and even outright decimation of the Boko Haram group. Abubakar Shekau, the group's leader has been killed numerous times as claimed by the military. But like the proverbial cat, he seems to possess nine lives. How a group technically defeated could muster such an assault is beyond our imagination.

President Muhammadu Buhari should be ashamed of his happening for he has failed not only in freeing all the Chibok girls, but also allowing another set of girls to undergo the inhumane and barbaric treatment these girls are bound to face. Now the military is rolling heavy machinery and personnel to try and rescue these girls. I dare say that only a fraction of the huge resources that will be expended to carry out rescue operations here would have been needed to man these hot spots in the volatile northeast.

If the government wishes to repair it’s now battered image, then it must quickly put its acts together and do something before it is too late. The media charade that trail this abduction were different agencies of government came up with different versions of events does speak well of a government ready to do the needful and bring back our girls.

List of abducted girls from dapchi Yobe state.