Candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the February 2019 presidential election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, said the N360 million proposed in this year’s Federal budget for Chibok school girls in American University of Nigeria (AUN), was not for students on his scholarship.

The Federal Ministry of Women Affairs has proposed this sum for the “specialised education programme” of the Chibok girls rescued by the Federal Government.

Atiku is the proprietor of AUN, and in 2014, while seeking the ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC), offered scholarship to 15 kidnapped Chibok girls who escaped from Boko Haram’s captivity.

Media Adviser to the PDP presidential candidate, Paul Ibe, in an interview Monday, explained that the students who would benefit from this year’s budget estimate were given scholarship by the Federal Government in 2017 following their release from captivity.

“AUN first housed 15 students who were given scholarships by Atiku in 2014.

“After their psychological healing, educational reorientation and social reintegration, some have moved on to university, while others returned to their families.

“In 2017, another batch of 106 were sponsored by FGN. They have been around ever since, but have fundamentally and remarkably changed on all fronts.

“They have been especially catered and cared for in an independent hostel and had special instructors and psychologists because of the peculiarity of their case.

“They are always involved and engaged in a variety of academic and extra-curricular activities, events and programmes,” Ibe further explained. (New Telegraph)

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