Release of kidnapped Nigerian schoolgirls in the balance

Nigerian women have led protests aimed at protecting girls following a mass abduction

Top Nigerian officials have taken a gamble by declaring a ceasefire with Boko Haram extremists and heralding a deal to free 219 schoolgirls abducted by the group six months ago, before they have been physically returned.

The response to Friday’s truce announcement from at least one faction behind the insurgency was brutal: a series of attacks in the remote northeastern states of Borno and Adamawa on Saturday that claimed dozens of lives.
Past ceasefires have similarly failed to take effect on the ground, and previous attempts to negotiate the release of the schoolgirls, whose kidnap in April caused international outrage, have unravelled at the last minute.
What is different about this purported deal is the weight of officials who have their names on it. They include Nigeria’s chief of defence staff, Air Vice-Marshal Alex Badeh, who has ordered army units to halt offensive operations; the president’s principal private secretary, Hassan Tukur, who has been conducting the negotiations; and the national security adviser, Colonel Sambo Dasuki.
President Goodluck Jonathan’s credibility is also on the line.

The release of the girls would provide a significant boost to Mr Jonathan ahead of a widely anticipated announcement that he will run for another term in office at elections due in February.

His reputation has taken a battering internationally as a result of the government’s hitherto bungled handling of the abductions, and the army’s poor performance withstanding Boko Haram’s campaign to carve out a strict Islamic state in remote territory bordering Cameroon.

Mr Tukur says he will return to Chad to finalise arrangements for the release of the girls. Other government officials have indicated that this could happen as early as Tuesday.
“Discussions will continue in Chad . . . and on the basis of those discussions we’ll have more details,” Mike Omeri, the government spokesman on the insurgency said.

But scepticism abounds. Two Nigerians who have been involved in past efforts to broker peace, human rights activist Shehu Sani and journalist Ahmad Salkida, poured cold water on the deal and questioned the authenticity of those purporting to be representing Boko Haram.

Mr Salkida said that the government’s optimism failed to take into account the ideology behind the insurgency. This “can only be neutralised after long hard work that is yet to start”, he tweeted.

However, the president’s spokesman, Doyin Okupe, told the FT that the ceasefire announcement was part of a process that had already yielded results. This began on October 9 when Boko Haram, as an opening gesture, released 27 hostages including 10 Chinese workers and the wife of Cameroon’s deputy prime minister. One government official said there was a video from the group announcing their side of the ceasefire, although it is not clear why this has not yet been made public.

Internal divisions within the insurgency make it unlikely that calm can be fully restored to the conflict zone any time soon. However, senior security officials believe there are factions who have sufficient discipline and control to release the kidnapped schoolgirls and potentially make a difference to the security climate, if they lay down their arms.
Even so, it might have been safer politically for Mr Jonathan to wait until the girls were in government custody before pre-empting the final outcome of the talks.
“This could do a lot to change perceptions of Jonathan but you would hope that anyone announcing the release of the girls would already have them. Because if it doesn’t happen, they are going to look ridiculous,” said one person familiar with the talks.
Negotiations were conducted in neighbouring Chad, with President Idriss Déby acting as a broker. The Nigerian government offered prisoner swaps and possibly an amnesty to Boko Haram fighters in return for the ceasefire and the release of the girls.
Nigeria used a combination of muscle and shuttle diplomacy to press Mr Déby into playing an intermediary role, after becoming increasingly infuriated with Boko Haram’s ability to access supplies through Chad.
“A lot of what’s happening out there is driven by the commercial interests of the players that govern those spaces. This local gangsterism can’t be allowed to destabilise wider interests. So we have had to do some tough negotiating with Déby,” a Nigerian presidency official told the FT.