The Nigeria Police Force has reacted to media reports of the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, suggesting that the last Dapchi school girl, will be released soon.
In a statement on Sunday, the Force Public Relations Officer, ACP Jimoh Moshood, said the IGP’s statement was “misunderstood and misquoted.”
IGP Idris had while addressing journalists at the Military Command and Control Center in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital said he had to shelve his visit to Dapchi in Yobe State where Boko Haram reportedly abducted over 100 students of the Government Girls Technical College.
“I am supposed to go to Dapchi today, let me be sincere with you but because of the girl (Leah Sharibu) that I learnt here will be released today,” he said on Saturday.
The police boss was in Maiduguri to visit the Theatre Commander Operation Lafiya Dole in the fight against insurgency in the troubled northeastern part of the country.
He added, “It is a sort of understanding that we don’t create much security (anxiety) there. By the time I fly (in a helicopter) there, they will think I break (in) and that is why I had to postpone the visit to Dapchi.”
But reacting, the Force Spokesperson regretted that some media reports misconstrued the statement credited to the nation’s police boss.
Moshood, an Assistant Commissioner of Police, said the misunderstanding could be partly because residents of the area anxiously awaited the safe return of the already released students.
The students, he noted, could not get to Yobe State owing to what the police termed as may be as “weather condition.”
Moshood explained, “The misunderstanding may be a result of the already released Dapchi School girls expected back home in Yobe State today but could not arrive due to weather condition. The IGP could not also proceed to Dapchi because of same weather condition.”
He, however, blamed the IGP’s inability to visit Dapchi to the same weather condition and said his statement reflected the true position of Mr Idris.
It will be recalled that the yet-to-be-released student, Miss Leah Sharibu, is owing to her inability to denounce her religious beliefs.
Read more at Channels TV.
