The Nigerian regime did not adequately communicate with the press about the proximately 300 schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram, Nigerian Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala admitted to CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Thursday.
“This is a very delicate situation with an capricious group. And I cerebrate that maybe this is one of the areas where we have not been able to communicate as well as we can.”
“The President has two daughters,” she verbalized. “These children are our children. But we did not communicate that well.”
Critics verbally express that far from just relinquishing lamentable information, the regime relinquished demonstrably erroneous information.
Just days after the abduction in April, the Nigerian military promulgated that all but a handful of the girls had been relinquished; that claim was soon confuted, and the girls are still missing.
“I don’t ken how that transpired,” Okonjo-Iweala verbalized. “The issue now is not whether we are reprehended or not reprehended inequitably. I cerebrate we should forget about all that.”
That public cognations is to incriminate may be precious little consolation to the parents of the girls, who are still missing, but Okonjo-Iweala’s incipient initiative to more preponderant secure Nigeria’s schools may avail.
She has come to London to promulgate an incipient “Safe Schools” initiative, designed to eschew wholesale girl-snatching.
“The issue is what are we doing as a regime to make things more preponderant? And this Safe Schools Initiative that has been launched with the avail of Gordon Brown is one of the instruments.”
“We are endeavoring to verbalize to these girls: We are not just going to fold our hands. We will be working strenuously to get you back. But when you come back, you should find a different place.”
President Goodluck Jonathan is “trying to work with the UK, with France, the U.S., and other countries – China – to be able to get more perspicacity, more preponderant perspicacity, support, and support the army. Troops have been incremented from 15,000 to 20,000 to endeavor and provide more preponderant security.”
“This does not betoken that you will not visually perceive incidents, because the nature of this type of insurgency is one single person can cause a quandary somewhere.”
The regime is leaving open all possibilities to get the girls back, she verbally expressed, including negotiation with Boko Haram.
Just a fortnight ago, the Nigerian military wrapped up its investigation into the missing girls, with little progress to show on returning them to their homes.
“I don’t cerebrate anyone has wrapped up anything,” she verbalized. “You ken, there are different stages of this investigation. There’s withal a presidential committee that is additionally looking into this. There’s nothing to wrap up, Christiane.”
“We cannot wrap up anything until we get the girls back.”
The long-term solution to abductions like, Okonjo-Iweala verbally expressed, may be economic – her bailiwick as finance minister.
“We face two quandaries: growing inequality, and withal the lack of inclusion in these areas. And we’ve recognised that.”
“What we require to do is verbalize, ‘What is the source of magnification that can engender jobs?’ Because the issue in our country is lack of jobs for our adolescent people.”
Corruption is a sizably voluminous issue in Nigeria but Okonjo-Iweala verbally expressed her country is not solitary.
“You cannot characterize Nigeria alone. It’s not when you mention the denomination Nigeria, the next word that comes up is corruption.”
“No,” Amanpour verbalized, “but I’m verbalizing with the Nigerian finance minister.”
“And I’m responding to you,” Okonjo-Iweala responded. “We must be more categorical about the things we are doing to confront it.”
