By Yemi Adebowale
Intense outrage in the Nigerian social media space greeted news of the appointment of Hadiza Bala Usman into the Presidential Inauguration Planning Committee of Nigeria’s President-Elect, Muhammadu Buhari on Friday.
Hadiza Bala Usman is the Founder of the #BringBackOurGirls campaign which was purportedly initiated to mobilise public support for the rescue of about 276 schoolgirls kidnapped in Chibok Town, Borno State, Nigeria on April 15, 2014.
The campaign, which has been criticized by observers for advancing the partisan interests of Nigeria’s incoming ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), had one of its frontline activists, Nigeria’s former Education Minister, Dr. Oby Ezekwesili making the 2015 TIME 100 list for her advocacy efforts.
In 2014, Chief Audu Ogbeh, a Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) openly acknowledged the #BringBackOurGirls campaign as an offshoot of the All Progressive Congress (APC), a statement for which he later apologized after massive public criticism and outrage.
Oby Ezekwesili at TIME 100 Gala |Photo: encomium.ng
At the time, Dr. Ezekwesili had also frowned at Audu Ogbeh’s statement, declaring: “I am neither covertly or overtly a member of the APC, PDP or any other party. It is false and wrong to say @BBOG_Nigeria is led by members of the APC.”
But contrary to Dr. Ezekwesili’s assertion, Hadiza Bala Usman, Founder of #BringBackOurGirls is a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC), a fact for which she has come under harsh public criticism against the background of her recent appointment by the President-Elect, Muhammadu Buhari.
“I have NEVER denied being a member of APC. I have been political and will always be political but standing up someone’s pain is in my DNA”, Ms. Usman declared via her Twitter page on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Nigerians have taken to the social media to express their anger over her supposedly non-partisan role in the #BringBackOurGirls campaign as Founder, and equally her new political appointment by President-Elect, Muhammadu Buhari which betrays the partisan involvement of her campaign for the missing girls all along.
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