The Nigerian Senate demanded updates from the nation’s security agencies on attempts to rescue girls abducted from the town of Chibok two years ago, CNN reports.
Lawmakers voted unanimously Friday to have leaders of security agencies brief the Senate on the efforts made to date.
The move follows the reporting by CNN of a proof-of-life video showing 15 of the girls.
“With the video and other things brought in, we need the security agents to brief us on what they have been able to achieve,” Sen. Shehu Sani told CNN by phone Friday.
“We expect the security chiefs to speak to the Senate early next week,” he said.
Sani was the first Nigerian senator to comment on the proof-of-life video, calling it credible during an interview on CNN’s Christiane Amanpour.
Asked Friday why the security chiefs had not appeared before the Senate at any point in the last two years, Sani told CNN by phone that the government’s focus had been on military action against Boko Haram, the terrorist group thought to be responsible for the kidnapping.
The military has succeeded in rescuing hundreds of women and girls, but CNN’s video has now given the Senate renewed impetus and added “a new dimension,” Sani said.
CNN’s reporting of the Chibok girls’ proof-of-life video “makes clear” that the kidnapping was not a hoax, and that the girls had not been killed, “or sold as sex slaves” according to the Nigerian senator.
Senators have also pledged to rebuild the school in Chibok, which still sits in disrepair.
The footage broke hearts worldwide, underlining the suffering of the Chibok mothers — and the plight faced by their daughters.
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