On a number of occasions over the last 2 years and change, Mrs. Oby Ezekwesili have had cause to march directly to Aso Villa to demand the release of the Chibok Girls. The movement for their release shows no sign of slowing down, especially with the release last week of a video showing many of them still alive and held captive by Abubakar Shekau, who now has control of just one faction of the group.

This time, however, Aunty Oby, as she is fondly called, has lent her voice to another cause: that of 2,000 recruits of the Nigerian Immigration Service who were disbanded without any explanation.

After the tragedy of the Immigration screening that occurred in 2014, for which no one was ever brought to justice, another recruitment exercise was done for over one million young people who went through the full battery of tests, and 2,000 of them were recruited in May 2015 and went through a training programme for three months, which again was very rigorous.

The problem began in August 20, 2015 coincidentally, a year ago to the day, when they were disbanded just a few days to their final parade. No explanation was given. The recruitment exercise was deemed illegal by the President, and for that, then Comptroller-General of the NIS, David Parradang, was removed and replaced by Kure Martins Abeshi.

Since then, the recruits have explored several avenues to get reinstated, and eventually on April 12 this year, the House of Representatives passed a resolution for their reabsorption.
This resolution was not implemented by the Presidency or the Ministry of Interior. In June, the recruits protested at the Ministry of Interior in Abuja, and Current Comptroller-General of Immigration, Mohammed Babandede promised to have them reinstated, but that has not happened either.

It is not like the NIS does not need recruits. The immediate past Comptroller-General has described the Service as underfunded and understaffed for the duties it needs to carry out. There are currently 1,400 border crossings that are unmanned, and these present significant security risks to the country.

Beyond this, and most importantly, there is the casual injustice that the Nigerian state once again metes out to its citizens, especially its young people. 2,000 people are now caught in a web of politics that they have nothing to do with. A recruitment process was carried out with a lot of rigour, and just because of a change in government, they are now literally left out in the cold.

It is urgent that this injustice is corrected as soon as possible, or else it will go down as the latest example of this government’s lack of empathy.