US-based international human rights lawyer Emmanuel Ogebe has told a US court that the Nigerian Government’s defamatory attacks on him through the Wall Street Journal was to distract from the mismanagement of over $20 million donated to Nigeria after the Chibok abductions.

In a special report, the BBC exposed how the Safe School Initiative started under President Goodluck Jonathan derailed under the incumbent Muhammadu Buhari administration.

In court filings in response to the Wall Street Journal’s lawyers this week, Ogebe stated:

1. Defendants’ claim this lawsuit is baseless. On the contrary it is their defamatory story that was baseless. Doug Wead was raising lots of money when he had no Nigerian schoolgirls to spend on; The Nigerian and Borno state governments were embezzling monies that they were not using on the schoolgirls; Wall Street Journal was making money from writing about the schoolgirls and Drew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson are personally now making money from publishing a book about the schoolgirls quite apart from the salaries they earned from their initial clickbait! Only the Plaintiff who actually took care of the schoolgirls made no money.

2. The Defendants’ prove themselves shameless liars by the evidence they doctored, hid and which has now come to light. They falsely claimed to have seen a video of Plaintiff showing pictures of the girls so as to fundraise. This was a reportage of alleged fact. Photos of the event prove Dew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson lied! They claimed Plaintiff lied about speaking with a UK ex-PM. Plaintiff’s remarks at the event about his interactions with the PM have been proven true by the correspondence with the Prime Minister which he exhibited See Exhibit RD2 Dkt 113.

3. The facts of Defendants’ proven lies is so critical that it merits further adumbration...

Ogebe, who had previously asked the court to investigate whether Defendant Drew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson’s new book “Bring Back Our Girls” was part of their quid pro quo for their defamatory attack on him on behalf of the Buhari administration, further stated:

“This case gains much more significance now not only because of how the corrupt conspirators enriched themselves but because one of the schoolgirls is heavily indebted in tens of thousands of dollars due to the destructive effect of Defendants’ WSJ’s defamatory reports and several more are in jeopardy while Hinshaw and Parkinson smile to the bank with their new book. Worse still Henshaw and Parkinson are reportedly exploiting the poor victims of terror by buying the life rights to their stories of suffering!

“The 7th anniversary of the infamous schoolgirl mass abductions is this week making more urgent the issues herein for the 112 girls still missing for whom advocacy for their freedom has slowed due to Defendants’ devastating defamation and mischaracterization as “political agenda.”

“Just last month, a Nigerian church refused to help Nigerian victims in Nigeria referred by Plaintiff citing the Defendant WSJ’s article as a reason.

“Accordingly, Plaintiff will take a leave of absence from his crucial human rights work helping others to rigorously seek legal redress through this court from the evil assault on his person and personality by the defamation and lynching of the Defendants WSJ mob.”

The ruling on whether the defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal will resume is scheduled for April 16, 2021 in a US Federal Court.

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