Failure is what Nigeria's Proof Of Life Video teaches Us

A video obtained by CNN International has sparked appears failure, tears, anger and hope in some corners of Nigeria. It is not a coincidence that CNN decides to publish the proof of life video on the eve of the two years anniversary of over 200 kidnapped Nigerian girls who were taken by Boko Haram from a school in the Nigeria’s northeastern region. It’s the first video evidence that 15 of the kidnapped girls may still be alive since their abduction from the town of Chibok.

“I am speaking on 25 December 2015, on behalf of all the Chibok girls and we are all well,” one of the girls says into the camera.

Boko Haram kidnapped 276 girls in April 2014, and the two-minute video claims to show 15 of those girls still alive. Someone close to the negotiations for their rescue handed the video to CNN, the broadcaster reported, and its digital marking reportedly dates it to last Christmas. The video shows the girls in two lines against beige-painted cement wall, their bodies covered entirely with black hijabs except for their faces. A voice off camera asks them their names, and from where they were taken.

The Nigerian government has failed thus far in its rescue effort. It is also true that the U.S and  international society has failed in its intelligence and rescue effort of the kidnapped girls.  Why the U.S intelligence withdrew its effort to locate the Nigerian girls remains a mystery. Nigeria’s Minister of Information,Lai Mohammed, told CNN the government had concerns the girls seemed too young, and that they’d not aged as much as expected, given their two years in captivity.