By Sadiq Abubakar
Maiduguri
Members of the Presidential Fact-finding Committee on the Abduction of the Chibok Schoolgirls have arrived in Maiduguri, the Borno state capital.
The committee, led by the chairman, Brig.-Gen. Ibrahim Sabo (rtd), arrived on Sunday evening aboard an Air Force plane.
The team was received by the Acting General Officer Commanding the 7th Division of Nigerian Army, Brig.-Gen. M. Y. Ibrahim, and officials of Borno state government.
According to a statement by the Committee’s Member/Spokesperson, Kingsley Osadolor, Sabo said the Committee had entered a crucial phase of its assignment. He said: “We are now in the main theatre where the Chibok schoolgirls were taken away against their will. The whole world is mobilised against the abduction, and we cannot be happy while our daughters remain in captivity.”
He said the Committee, while in Borno state, would engage a broad spectrum of stakeholders to enable it to have a holistic appreciation of the matter and advise the federal government accordingly.
During a courtesy call on the Shehu of Borno, at his palace yesterday, the committee chairman recalled that, historically, Maiduguri was a famous centre in the Trans-Sahara Trade, but regretted that the city and the state had suffered severe socio-economic dislocation as a result of insurgency in recent years.
Responding, the Shehu of Borno, Dr Abubakar Garbai Ibn El-Kanemi, described the Chibok abduction as “unfortunate,” saying that the Kanem Borno Empire had been in existence for some 1, 200 years.