Nigeria's government has seemed uncaring and inept in the wake of the mass kidnapping, and it, too, stands accused of committing atrocities in the name of security, particularly in the north, where the girls were snatched by the extremist Islamist group Boco Haram.
The US can help by highlighting the criminal action and by prodding the Nigerian government to make the girls’ rescue an urgent priority, some Africa experts say. But the US also must take into account the conditions that made the kidnapping of more than 300 girls possible.
“If these girls are being carted around in convoys of vehicles and the [Nigerian] military is unable or unwilling to do anything about it, there are reasons for that,” says Bronwyn Bruton, deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center in Washington. Noting the “information vacuum” Nigeria's government is confronting in the area, she says, “it’s very unlikely that none of the local populations know where these girls are.” The reluctance to talk, she adds, “is an indication of the deep distrust the local population feels toward the national leadership.”
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