I Have Spent N10b Supporting Military Operations..Borno Governor..Plans To Relocate Chibok Girls

The Borno State Governor, Alhaji Kashim Shettima, said the state government had spent over N10bn to provide support for the military operations against the Boko Haram insurgency in the state since 2011.

This, he said, was against the N200m spent on the war by the Federal Government during the same period.

Shettima also promised to relocate the abducted Chibok schoolgirls to other parts of the country to complete their secondary school education after their release.

He said this when the Chairman, Chibok Local Government, Mr. Baana Lawan, led the parents of the abducted schoolgirls to his office on Monday.

The governor said the state government would sponsor all the girls to schools in Abuja, Kano, Lagos, Kaduna or any other states of the country to complete their secondary school education.

It will be recalled that the girls were sitting for their final year examinations when they were kidnapped in their hostel on April 14.

Shettima said, “It is mandatory for the state government to ensure the speedy return or release of the girls and it is the sole responsibility of government to see that these our children are back home without politicising the matter.

“This is not politics, there is no need to play politics with the abduction of these children. We have children and we know what it is for these girls to be missing.”

Meanwhile, the Secretary to the Borno State Government, Ambassador Baba Jidda, who represented Shettima at a media briefing in Lagos said that the state government had spent N10bn on the Boko Haram war since 2011.

He revealed this in a transcript of a meeting held with some journalists in Lagos.

In a copy of the transcript recieved on Monday, Shettima said the state was forced to disclose the figures because of a growing campaign of calumny against the state government.

He explained that it was sad that certain individuals had taken it upon themselves to misinform the public by accusing the state government of doing nothing to assist the military in its operations in the state.

Earlier, Lawan had said he could only come with 27 students out of those freed and 32 parents because some of the students had relocated with their parents to other parts of the country.