The Special Adviser to the President on Policy Communication, Daniel Bwala, has justified President Bola Tinubu’s call for the resignation of former President Goodluck Jonathan following the 2014 abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls, describing the demand as legitimate.
Bwala stated this on Wednesday during an interview on Channels Television programme, The Morning Brief, where he defended Tinubu’s position at the time, citing what he described as poor crisis handling and denial by the Jonathan administration.
According to him, the former administration lacked a clear solution to the security challenge posed by the mass abduction, which drew global outrage and placed Nigeria under intense international scrutiny.
“In the days of Jonathan, they didn’t have an idea of the solution. They were in denial about the Chibok girls’ kidnapping. When Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu called for Jonathan’s resignation, it was a legitimate call,” Bwala said.
The 2014 abduction of over 200 schoolgirls from Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, became a defining moment in Nigeria’s security crisis and triggered sustained global campaigns for the victims’ release.
In recent months, Tinubu’s earlier call has been revisited by critics as mass abductions of schoolchildren continue under the current administration, amid renewed insecurity across several parts of the country.
However, Bwala argued that the security situation under Jonathan was significantly worse, claiming that terrorist groups had gained territorial control in several communities and were even collecting taxes from residents.
He further defended the Tinubu administration’s approach to insecurity, insisting that the Federal Government maintains a strict no negotiation policy with kidnappers and terrorists.
“There was a time the federal government was negotiating with terrorists. Even former Kaduna State governor, Nasir el Rufai, once spoke about a national policy where both the federal and state governments could negotiate in certain situations,” he said.
Bwala warned that such negotiations and ransom payments only strengthen criminal networks by providing the financial resources needed to procure weapons and expand their operations.
“But President Tinubu came with this zero tolerance on negotiation because it did not fit into terrorism financing. You are constructively financing terrorism without knowing it,” he added.
He said ransom payments not only encourage further abductions but also empower criminal elements to carry out more deadly attacks.
