Chibok girls: Presidency dumps committee’s report

The Presidency may have dumped the reports of its fact finding committee on the abduction of over 200 student of Government Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State by the insurgent group, Boko Haram. The Presidency had on May 2, this year set up the committee headed by Brig General Ibrahim Sabo, to unravel the issues surrounding the abduction of the girls who were abducted on April 14. The committee submitted its report on June 20 in Abuja to the president, stating that 219 girls were still missing. The Sabo committee also disclosed that a total of 276 girls were abducted by members of the Boko Haram Sect, stating that 57 of the girls had since escaped while 219 were still unaccounted for. Three weeks after the submission of its report, however, the Presidency appears not to have made use of the document. According to sources close to the Presidency, the seat of power was not favourably disposed to some of the issues raised in the report, which were deemed to be very controversial. This is just as the Defence Headquarters, DHQ, said that it had not received any directives over the report or its implementation. According to the source, “some of the issues as contained in that report are quite controversial and are considered by security agencies to be of security risk to the country. Mr. President and the security chiefs are not very disposed to considering some of those issues.” The source said that there were still doubts as to some of the claims in the report and that government was not willing to jump into conclusion and order its implementation. Speaking to Saturday Mirror, Director of Defence Information, DDI, Maj-Gen. Chris Olukolade, who disclosed that the military had not got any directives on the committee’s report, said that government had received the report did not mean that it had accepted it. He said that implementation could only become possible if it had been accepted by government. “Have you found out whether government has accepted the report? That it has received it does not mean that it has accepted it. It must pass through processes and become a white paper before it can be implemented,” Olukolade stated.