Former minister of Education, Oby Ezekwesili, has faulted what she described as calm “shocking” silence on the death of 26 Nigerians at the Mediterranean.
The deceased, mostly teenagers, were reportedly sexually abused and murdered while trying to cross the sea.
Abike Dabiri–Erewa, Senior Special Assistant to the president on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, had condemned the tragic incident.
“There has to be sustained awareness campaigns on the dangers inherent in such journeys. Migration policies are getting tougher all over,” she had said.
But writing via her Twitter handle on Wednesday, Ezekwesili said a presidential aide is “not enough voice to hear when a country loses 26 of her citizens in such embarrassing tragedy in the Mediterranean Sea”.
She said Buhari’s silence on the deaths questions whether the life of every citizen matters.
“President Muhammadu Buhari, shocking that you personally have not acknowledged that 26 of the citizens that you are their president drowned in the Mediterranean Sea and the whole world is talking about it. This is not leadership, sir,” she wrote.
“It is callous for any leadership to never feel the pains that tragedies bring the way of a people. Can your Federal Government signal to the Nigerian Public that #NigerianCitizensLivesMatter? Can you?”
