President Goodluck Jonathan on Monday said the Federal Government’s efforts aimed at rescuing the over 200 schoolgirls abducted in Chibok, Borno State were constrained by the overriding imperative of ensuring that the girls’ lives are not endangered in any rescue attempt.
A statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, quoted the President as speaking while granting audience to Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani Girl-Child Education Campaigner at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Jonathan was quoted as saying that the notion that the Federal Government has not been doing enough to find and rescue the abducted girls was wrong and misplaced.
He said the government was doing everything possible to ensure that the girls were rescued alive and safely returned to their parents.
“Terror is relatively new here and dealing with it has its challenges. The great challenge in rescuing the Chibok girls is the need to ensure that they are rescued alive,” Jonathan was quoted as saying.
He said the Federal Government and its security agencies were mindful of the need to avoid the scenario in rescue attempts in other parts of the world where lives of abductees were lost in the effort to rescue them.
The President said that this challenge notwithstanding, the Federal Government was actively pursuing all feasible options to achieve the safe return of the abducted girls.
“The time it is taking to achieve that objective is not a question of the competence of the Nigerian Government. We have had teams from the United States, Britain, France, Israel and other friendly nations working with us here on the rescue effort and they all appreciate the challenges and the need to thread carefully to achieve our purpose,” he said.
The President told Malala that he fully empathized with the pain and anguish of the abducted girls’ parents, adding that he would meet with the parents himself before they leave Abuja to personally comfort them and reassure them that the Federal Government was doing all within its powers to rescue their daughters.
President Jonathan reiterated his aministration’s commitment to ensuring the safe and proper education of all Nigerian children.
“I personally believe that since about 50 per cent of our population are female, we will be depriving ourselves of half of our available human resources if we fail to educate our girls adequately or suppress their ambitions in any way.
“We are therefore taking steps to curb all forms of discrimination against girls and women, and have also undertaken many affirmative actions on their behalf,” President Jonathan said.
Jonathan said that the Federal Government was also proactively evolving and implementing policies and measures that will benefit the abducted Chibok girls when they are safely rescued, as well as others that have been adversely affected by the Boko Haram insurgency.
These, the President said, included the establishment of a Victims’ Support Fund, the Safe Schools Initiative and the Presidential Initiative for the North East.
He announced that he would inaugurate a National Committee to oversee fundraising for the Victims’ Support Fund, which will also cater for families of security men and women who have lost their lives in the war against terrorism on Wednesday.
Follow Us
