Connect with us

Hi, what are you looking for?

News

I Never Rejected British Offer to Rescue Chibok Girls – Jonathan

Nigeria’s former President, Goodluck Jonathan, has denied a report by British newspaper, The Observer, that he rejected an offer by the the British military to rescue more than 270 school girls abducted by the Boko Haram.

Reports by The Observer claim the Royal Air Force of the United Kingdom, on a mission named Operation Turus, conducted air recce over northern Nigeria for several months after the girls were taken in April 2014.

“The girls were located in the first few weeks of the RAF mission,” a source involved in Operation Turus told the Observer. “We offered to rescue them, but the Nigerian government declined.”

A statement by Jonathan’s media adviser, Ikechukwu Eze, said the lies in this report are self-evident, noting that Nigerians are conversant with the effort made by the Jonathan administration to rescue the girls.

Eze said the media actively covered the multinational efforts and collaboration which involved some of the major powers deploying their crack intelligence officers to work with Nigerian security operatives, and those of its neighbours.

“In the course of the mission, the international team, including members from Nigeria’s neighbours of Chad, Niger and Cameroun, met regularly with our own intelligence officers to plan and conduct their operations.

“In fact, the Jonathan administration was so genuinely supportive that the foreign powers involved were granted permission to overfly our airspace, while conducting the search and rescue missions,” he said.

According to Eze, the ex-president personally wrote to former U.S president, Barack Obama, President Francois Hollande of France, David Cameron, the former Prime Minister of the UK, including personal contacts made to the Governments of Israel and China, seeking their assistance in the search for the abducted Chibok girls.

“We are however not surprised that this kind of concocted story is coming out at this point in time, as it appears that some people who have obviously been playing politics with the issue of the Chibok girls will stop at nothing to further their interest.”

__________

Follow us on Twitter at @thesignalng

Copyright 2017 SIGNAL. Permission to use portions of this article is granted provided appropriate credits are given to www.signalng.com and other relevant sources.

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Advertisement

Related

News

Former President Goodluck Jonathan is expected in Takum, Taraba state on the 23rd of February, 2024 to commission the Kashimbilla Dam and the airport....

News

Former President Goodluck Jonathan, on Friday, urged political leaders to end tension and political altercations to enable Nigeria to move forward. Jonathan stated this...

News

Former President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday met with President Bola Tinubu in the Villa. Jonathan, who doubles as Head of the ECOWAS Mediation Team...

News

Barely two months to the end of the second term of the present administration, the presidency is convinced that like Jonathan, Nigerians will yearn...

Copyright ©