Quit throwing childish tantrums- presidential aide, Lauretta Onochie tells BBOG co-convener: Aisha Yesufu in an Open letter

Last week, co-convener of the Bring Back Our Girls Group BBOG, Aisha Yesufu, posted a video online calling on President Buhari to resign (Read here) 

In this open letter, Lauretta Onochie who is president Buhari's PA on Social Media, asked Aisha to stop throwing Childish tantrums. According to Onochie, Aisha is afraid that the campaign for the girls is coming to an end and so she might have nothing else to do with her life and asked Aisha to immediately seek help. Read the letter after the cut...

Dear Aisha Yesufu,

I do hope you are feeling a bit better than you did at the point you had a meltdown or better still, a recorded video nervous breakdown, over a government Nigerians say is serving them better.

Most Nigerians were shocked and are still confused at your tantrum. Nigerians understood and identified with your frustration at not being able to get the government of Pres. Jonathan to take responsibilities for the missing girls. Nigerians and the whole world were with you and the rest of the #BBOG campaign team. I joined in the UK, helping to drum up support internationally, for the campaign to free our girls.

But your childish tantrum and incoherent ranting at Pres. Buhari were totally uncalled for especially as it is less than two weeks since 83 of the Chibok girls, gained their freedom, under the government of Muhammadu Buhari and yes, Acting President Osinbajo.

Over the nearly two years since the inception of this government, you have turned the campaign on its head and the campaign is taking a personal and malicious dimension. That’s what long campaigns do to those who set out to engage in campaigns with personal and selfish motives embedded.

Aisha, the warning signs are all there that it’s now all about you. You began to feel that if an advocacy does not submit to the #BBOG format, then it’s wrong. What the whole world wants is for the girls to be rescued and brought home to their loved ones. That’s the point. The focal point.

You also began to feel that the captivity of our missing girls weighs more heavily on your heart than on the hearts of President Buhari, Acting Pres. Osinbajo and others. Consequently, when the Wife of the President, Mrs. Aisha Buhari, launched a book in honour of the missing girls and donated all the proceeds to the Chibok and the Buni Yadi parents, all hell broke loose because she did not obtain permission from you. You obviously have a skewed view of your place in our nation. You are not the one who decides how people render support to others.

You have lost touch with the reality that how we contribute to the advocacy, differ from person to person. Again, you began to forget that #BBOG is not a franchise and so you do not have the exclusive rights to run the campaign. You lost the ability to respect, appreciate and accommodate others’ styles and contributions towards the campaign to bring our girls home.

For someone who has become obviously obsessed with the idea that the #BBOG campaign platform is now a personal business venture, it can be very frustrating to see the whole world, showering praises on President Muhammadu Buhari for the return of some of the girls. Ordinarily, what could have been a source of joy and pride for you too, has become a source of anger because in your warped mind, you did it all alone and only you deserve the accolades.

But the accolades on Pres. Buhari are well deserved. The government of Pres. Buhari, like any other responsible and responsive government across the world, is definitely doing a lot of things differently from the previous administration which has culminated in the return of not only some of our Chibok Girls but also, thousands of Nigerians from the North East who were also abducted and taken into captivity.

Furthermore, your obsession with wanting to set up a camp in the Presidential Villa, completely blinded you to the fact that this government has actually begun to realise what the #BBOG campaign was set up to achieve. Evidence abound that the government of the day is totally committed to the theme of your campaign. Unlike the government of Pres. Jonathan that needed convincing that the girls were indeed missing, the Nigerian government under Pres. Buhari, from its inception, put processes in place to search for and recover the Chibok girls.

So what ticked you off on the wrong side, Aisha? Are you not pleased that the Pres. Buhari led government is recovering the girls? Are you afraid of what shape your life would take if all the girls were recovered and the campaign folds up?

Whats your real reason for wanting Pres. Buhari and Acting President Yemi Osinbajo our of the way? Is there a sinister motive that you are hiding from all of us? Venting your anger in the way you did in the video, clearly suggests that you had expected something to happen that would bring about the end of the Buhari/Osinbajo Administration but that thing did not happen. Could it be the much touted Coup de tat? Just asking!

I do understand that you do not understand that it’s okay to appreciate this government for the much it has done and keeps doing to secure the return of all captives in our nation.

This is a clear pointer that you have lost the plot and need help! I believe too, like many well meaning Nigerians that you have successfully hijacked the #BBOG Campaign for your selfish ends so you need to step aside for the #BBOG Campaign to refocus and find its bearing.

This will accord you the time to reflect of your recent actions and seek help. I do mean it in the nicest way. YOU NEED HELP, Sis.

On the 17th of January 2016, I had cause to make the same suggestion to Ms. Bukky  Shonibare. I have no way of knowing  if she took my counsel or not, but her pattern of campaign has assumed a fairly more sensible and reasonable face.

Again, everyone I know in the campaign, has something else they are doing. Bukky is now a Social Entrepreneur, working to support an IDP camp and making a success of it.

Dr. Oby Ezekwesili’s busy lifestyle outside the BBOG’s Campaign, is well documented and in the public domain.

Mrs. Hadiza Bala Usman joined politics and although still campaigning for the safe return of our girls, she’s now the boss at the Nigerian Ports Authority.

Mrs Dolapo Osinbajo, the wife of the Acting President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, is still supporting the campaign to bring back all our girls and playing her role in supporting the rehabilitation of the girls that have so far been rescued.

You would have still had this nervous breakdown had all the girls returned two weeks ago, because that would have meant the end of the campaign, a reality, you are not prepared to face up to in your present hate-filled state of mind. Howbeit, Our prayers have been that all the girls are recovered and brought home safely.

Once you have repented of your machinations and attention-seeking tantrums, in addition to running the campaign, you’ll need to find something else to engage yourself. As they say, “An idle mind is the devils workshop”.

#BBOG was doing a fantastic job of advocacy for the return of the missing girls. So is the Murtala Mohammed Foundation, the wife of the President, Mrs Aisha Buhari and millions of other individuals across the world. The recovered girls are being given the best of all round care, as enumerated by the Hon. Minister of Women Affairs, Hajia Aisha Al-Hassan.

Advocacy for the return of our Chibok girls doesn’t have to be a one-size-fit-all. It’s not the exclusive right of any group or persons. The important thing is that we all want our girls home and alive. The goal is the same. And that goal is being achieved in the midst of Pres. Buhari giving further assurances that all will continue to be done to find the remaining girls and bring them home to their families. That’s our focus. That should be yours too. Repent and quit throwing childish tantrums!

Sincerely,

Lauretta Onochie

@Laurestar

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