Presidency, Atiku war of words over rescue of Oyo school children, teachers

The Presidency on Saturday accused former Vice President Atiku Abubakar of failing to rejoice with the federal government hours after the release of students and teachers kidnapped from a school in Oriire Local Government Area of ​​Oyo State.

However, Atiku who is the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) rejected the Presidency claims, describing the allegations as reckless distortion of facts and cannot be proven due to documentary evidence.
Presidential spokesperson, Bayo Onanuga, in a tweet on his verified X account, @aonanuga1956, accused Atiku of never deeming it appropriate to address and congratulate the government at the center and security agencies hours after the victims were rescued on Friday.

The presidential media aide in the tweet stated: “Almost 18 hours after Oriire students and their teachers regained their freedom, Atiku Abubakar @atiku deemed it inappropriate to rejoice with Tinubu’s federal government, security agencies and the traumatized victims.

“Previously, he used the kidnapping as a campaign weapon several times since the incident happened 57 days ago. Now that the kidnap victim has come out, Atiku’s internet channel is quiet. No comments. No words of praise. Maybe, the veteran presidential candidate is waiting for bad news to attack Tinubu’s government.

But in a statement issued by Senior Special Assistant on Public Communications, Phrank Shaibu, the ADC presidential candidate said “there are only two possible explanations for the latest outburst of anger issued by the Presidency: the media managers were either too lazy to find out the publicly available facts before rushing to attack the opposition, or they were too embarrassed by the substance of their statements to acknowledge their existence.”

The statement quoted Atiku as saying, “It is astonishing that a Presidency with unlimited public resources can accuse someone of silence without carrying out the most basic verification.

“Either they failed to read our statement because they were too lazy to do so, or they deliberately ignored it because it revealed uncomfortable truths about their misplaced priorities.”

Atiku insisted that he had issued a comprehensive press statement earlier on Satire day, entitled ‘A Warring Nation Needs a Supreme Commander, Not a Campaign Commander’, in which he welcomed the rescue and praised the security agencies involved.

“What we refuse to do is praise a Commander-in-Chief who, at a moment of national importance, remains publicly busy with partisan political activity rather than personally leading the country in celebrating the successes of our troops and reassuring the families whose loved ones are still being held hostage,” he said.

Atiku’s previous statement accused Tinubu of prioritizing politics over national security.

He noted that the rescue coincided with the launch of the All Progressives Congress’ door-to-door campaign ahead of the 2027 elections, which he described as troubling.

“The politics of re-election should not occupy the government’s attention while innocent schoolchildren remain in the custody of kidnappers for weeks,” he said, adding that “yesterday should have been dedicated to the war room, not the campaign room,” he said.

Atiku added that no amount of propaganda could erase the questions raised in his previous statement, pointing to children still detained in Borno State and elsewhere.

“The rescue of the Oyo school children brought joy to the country, but Nigerians are still asking: When will the abducted children in Borno State and other innocent citizens across the country also regain their freedom? These questions remain unanswered,” he said.