The failed high level negotiations between Boko
Haram leaders and the Nigerian government
team, led by a former Minister of Information,
Edwin Clark, would have seen the country
swapping 16 detained terrorists for 220 Chibok
girls, PREMIUM TIMES can authoritatively
report today.
The names submitted for the swap are said to
contain mainly the sect’s middle commanders
who are being detained in various detention
centres across the country.
They are:
1.Mustapha Umar
2.Baba Alhaji
3 Baba Gana Mongunu
4.Mallam Bashir Kachallah
5.Mallam Baraa
6. Mallam Baba Gana
7. Mallam Baba Mala
8. Mallam Abakar
9. Mallam Ibrahim
10. Mallam Awana
11. Mallam Yarema
12. Mallam Albani Jos
13. Mallam Tuja.
Sources close to the negotiation said there are
three other insurgents whose names were
communicated through telephone calls, during
later discussions, directly to representatives of
the International Federation of Red Cross and
Red Crescent Societies, who facilitated the talks.
Two names were initially sent but shortly
afterwards, one more was called in making a
total of 16.
As we reported Thursday , after weeks of tough
negotiations, the government and Boko Haram
sides finally accepted to what famously came to
be dubbed the “prisoner swap” of the Chibok
girls with some commanders of the Boko Haram
fighting forces.
Insiders to the talk said the insurgents were
“initially modest in their demands, asking for
just 10 of their field captains who appear to
have a holding grip on the imagination of the
fighting forces.” At this time, this was against
the whole abducted girls.
While the security forces were combing
detention centres, shopping for the 10 detainees,
our sources say something strange happened,
suggesting internal struggles in the camp of the
insurgency forces.
Our sources understood the “happening” to be a
factional disagreement on the ethnic
composition of the 10 names tabled for the
swap. “They were all of Kanuri nationality and
it appeared the Hausa/Fulani faction protested
this.”
The result of this disagreement was about one
week delay in the negotiations after which a
“new list of 15 was tabled, and then it was
increased to 16”.
The ICRC was then working with security forces
to identify the names on the list. In this period,
it wasn’t clear if security forces had all the
names in demand, a situation that triggered a
new frustration in the talks, according to our
sources. Were they never captured or were they
killed in battle or extra-judicially?
Our sources said some of those identified
insisted that although they were being held by
Nigerian security forces based on allegations of
being Boko Haram members, they were not
terrorists or members of the sect and would
never agree to a release based on prisoner swap
arrangement with the deadly group.
This development, according to one of our
sources, led discussions along a frozen path.
“We almost lost 10 days again to this but after a
meeting at the Kuje prisons, near Abuja, where
Mustapha Umar, one of the commanders on the
list was held, the government team saw a new
ray of hope.”
However, distrust was now building and the
team of two Boko Haram negotiators switched
the terms of demand from 16 sect commanders
for all the girls, to only 30 girls.
But Mr. Clark, according to our sources, told
them there was no realism in their demands
and that if they so cherished their compatriots,
the smartest deal for them was to release all the
girls. At any rate, Mr. Clark reportedly argued
that such a deal would put President Jonathan at
the butt of a new wave of criticism and provide
fodder for the opposition. So this was not
acceptable, he reportedly insisted.
“Swap is not our idea but the idea of the
government,“ the Boko Haram negotiators
initially argued, trying to insist on the high
road, but they later deferred to the age of Mr.
Clark, according to our sources.
At this point also, the ICRC team clarified the
terms of their engagement, insisting that before
the swaps, they would need clear commitments
from the abducted girls and the detained
fighters. “Prisoners and the girls must offer
consent before the deal can be closed” ICRC
insisted. To get the consent of the girls the ICRC
said they were prepared to risk going into the
enclave of the insurgency.
The Boko Haram negotiators reportedly said
they were comfortable with this, and that it will
also help “dispel the claims that the girls were
being maltreated or that they have been forced
into marriage which will shock many people
when the girls return.”
With the Abuja negotiations sealed, Yola, the
Adamawa state capital, was agreed as the point
of swap. Government negotiators favoured a
discreet arrangement where they would sneak
into Yola, the Red Cross would take custody of
the girls, and in turn yield the Boko Haram
detainees to them and conclude the swap.
The management of the Yola episode, according
to our sources, put paid to the whole
arrangement. The government, in an exuberant
show of enthusiasm chartered a Boeing 737 jet
to convey the girls to Abuja from Yola. What
was thought to be a discreet arrangement
turned into a fantasia and loud orchestra show.
Moreover, “when we arrived Yola, half of the
airport was covered with security forces” noted
one of the insiders to the deal.
“Then they moved negotiators to the
presidential lounge for a two-hour wait…then 48
hours in the hotel…but Yola had been infiltrated
by these people and the security presence sent a
wrong signal…clearly these people didn’t trust
the arrangement and they never showed up.”
Apart from Mr. Clark, others who participated
in the negotiation were two notable Nigerian
civil rights leaders, Fred Eno, and Shehu Sani,
Maiduguri-based lawyer, Mustapha Zanna, and
PDP chieftain, Kaka Bolori, along with three top
officials of the International Red Cross
headquarters office in Geneva which served as
the “interface” negotiators, and two field
captains of the Boko Haram sect.
When contacted Wednesday, some of the
principal actors in the collapsed negotiation
declined to provide details, saying it’s still
premature to divulge “sensitive details”.
“The whole thing is unfortunate, but hopefully
we can revive the negotiations,” one of the
negotiators, Fred Eno, told PREMIUM TIMES.
“The president desperately wanted the girls
released, but politics of positioning stood in the
way of progress.”
The President of the Kaduna-based Civil Rights
Congress, Shehu Sani, insisted he was not
comfortable discussing the matter at this time,
suggesting that it was irrelevant talking about
what worked and what didn’t work at least until
the girls are rescued.
Mr. Clark did not answer or return calls made
to his telephone on Thursday morning. He also
did not respond to a text message sent to him.
Benoit Matsha-Carpentier, the Senior Media
Officer for the International Federation of Red
Cross and Red Crescent Societies, was also
unavailable Thursday morning. He is yet to
return calls made to him.
Spokespersons for the Nigerian presidency were
also unavailable to provide insight regarding
why the administration acted the way it did in
the final minutes of the negotiation. Reuben
Abati, the Special Adviser to the President on
Media and Publicity, as well as Doyin Okupe, the
senior special assistant on Public Affairs, didn’t
answer or return calls Thursday morning.
The over 200 girls, mostly teenagers, were
kidnapped from their secondary school in
Chibok, Borno State, on April 14.
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