BBOG, Buhari’s daughter ‘fight’ over Chibok girls franchise

The excitement that took over Nigerians immediately after the release of 21 out of 218 girls abducted from Government Secondary School, Chibok, has pitched the Bring Back Our Girls, BBOG advocacy group against a daughter of President Muhammadu Buhari, Hajiya Hadiza Bello-Buhari.

The bone of contention between the BBOG, which has been in the forefront of agitations to free the Chibok girls, and Africa Support and Empowerment Initiative, AFRISEI, belonging to Buhari-Bello is for the Chibok girls.

The BBOG, in a statement signed by its leaders, Aisha Yesufu and former a former Minister of Education, Oby Ezekwesili, accused AFRISEI of franchise infringement.

The BBOG, which dissociated itself from an AFRISEI fundraiser, also demanded an immediate retraction and unreserved apology from the organisers of the event.

It also called on the general public to disregard attempts at linking the group to the event.

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AFRISEI, however, in a statement issued by Buhari-Bello and Don Uche, President and Secretary respectively, replied that it did not need to lean on the BBOG to be of service to the Chibok Girls.

The group maintained in the statement that AFRISEI does not need “to steal anything from BBOG or use its name to achieve any advantage.

“The Africa Support and Empowerment Initiative has its own defined objectives and that it didn’t need to steal anybody’s ideas to operate in line with its own objectives.

“Given the size of the problem at hand, the more organisations we have assisting Chibok and other devastated communities, the better for the country.”

Not done with the controversy, Ezekwesili, while reacting to AFRISEI’s statement,  in a series of tweets on her Twitter handle, insisted that the BBOG decided it would have nothing to do with fundraising, demanding to know what is hard to understand in it.

“What’s hard to understand? From the outset in 2014, @BBOG_Nigeria DECIDED that the Movement shall NEVER be mired in DONATIONS. Simple.”

“WE, @BBOG_Nigeria DON’T RAISE FUNDS. If your organization is RAISING FUNDS, don’t call it “BBOG STAKEHOLDERS”. ETHICS matter, not so?”

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