By CHRIS STEIN | The New York Times
LAGOS, Nigeria — People fanned out on bicycles and on foot across a remote region of northeastern Nigeria on Friday to notify the families of 21 girls that they had been liberated by Boko Haram, the Islamist extremist group, after two and a half years of captivity.
Roads in the area are poor, and Boko Haram had blown up cellphone towers in the region, so many people had not heard the news that the 21 girls — among the more than 270 who were seized from a boarding school in the town of Chibok on April 14, 2014 — were freed on Thursday in a deal brokered by the Swiss government.
“We are not all in the same towns,” Yakubu Nkeki, the chairman of a parents’ group that has urged more aggressive efforts to secure the girls’ release, said in a phone interview on Friday, adding that some of the relatives lived as far as 12 miles from Chibok.
But even as the nation rejoiced, relatives of an additional 197 girls who are believed to still be held by Boko Haram were crushed when a handwritten list of the freed girls was released and they saw that their sisters, nieces and daughters were not on it.
“Many of them reacted so disappointed, because they were feeling that ‘Maybe my daughter will be among them,’” said Sambido Hosea, a leader of a community of people from Chibok in Abuja, the capital.
One of those people, Ayuba Alamson, had hoped for news of two cousins, Ruth Amos and Mary Ali, who were abducted. Their names were not among the 21, he said, although several of the released schoolgirls were part of his extended family.
“I am somehow worried, and a lot of people will be worried,” he said in a phone interview, “but at the same time, I am somehow happy for a lot of my relations, now that these girls have been found.”
None of the 21 have gone home yet or spoken publicly about the ordeal, although several appeared at a news conference on Thursday with Vice President Yemi Osinbajo. Doctors, social workers, psychologists and trauma experts are looking after the girls at a medical center in Abuja. One gave birth during her captivity and is nursing a 20-month-old boy, who was also released.
Muhammadu Buhari, who made securing the girls’ release a cornerstone of his campaign last year for Nigeria’s presidency, said Friday that around 100 other girls were “somewhere in the area of Lake Chad,” but that the government did not know precisely where.
Speaking in Berlin alongside Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, where he was paying an official visit, Mr. Buhari said that Nigerian security forces had “almost succeeded” in ensuring that there was no area of the country where Boko Haram dominates. He also said his wife, Aisha Buhari, “belongs to my kitchen,” responding to comments she made to the BBC criticizing the makeup of his government. The comment drew outrage from Nigerians on social media who saw the remark as sexist.
The mass kidnapping was condemned around the world, and a campaign, Bring Back Our Girls, drew attention to the girls’ plight and to the violence carried out by Boko Haram in northern Nigeria, where more than 20,000 people have been killed and more than two million forced to flee.
Pressure mounted on Mr. Buhari’s administration after months without any news, although his government recently disclosed that it had been negotiating with Boko Haram.
Several dozen girls escaped shortly after they were abducted, and in May vigilantes in northeast Nigeria stumbled upon Amina Ali, another who was able to flee. But scores of others remain unaccounted for.
The Nigerian and Swiss governments on Friday denied a report by The Associated Press that the government had released four Boko Haram militants in exchange for the 21 girls.
“The government has no reason to conceal a swap, if indeed it took place, considering that the president has repeatedly stated his readiness to swap fighters for the girls if necessary,” the Nigerian government said in a statement.
The A.P., citing an unidentified Nigerian hostage negotiator who was not involved in the release of the girls, said Switzerland had paid a ransom on behalf of the Nigerian government and would recoup the money from about $321 million that it had committed to repatriate to Nigeria this year from frozen assets looted during the dictatorship of Sani Abacha.
Asked about the report, a spokesman for the Swiss Foreign Ministry, Jean-Marc Crevoisier, denied it.
“There is no connection between the liberation of the young girls and the restitution of the Abacha funds,” Mr. Crevoisier said.
A spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross said the agency had acted as a “neutral intermediary” and “didn’t take part in the negotiations.”
Although Boko Haram has been weakened by internal divisions — a splinter faction, endorsed by the Islamic State, no longer follows the group’s leader, Abubakar Shekau — it remains formidable, according to Andrew Walker, who wrote a recent book on Boko Haram’s rise.
“Stories of factional fighting are emerging, but it is unlikely the military will be able to capitalize on this,” Mr. Walker said. “The military for the most part are still poorly trained, poorly motivated and poorly equipped; also they act almost like a foreign occupying force. Their brutality toward the general population will help to bring the insurgency to an end and may be adding to the rapidly escalating food and humanitarian crisis.”
Unicef warned in July that 250,000 children were at risk of starvation in the northeast, where Boko Haram has been active.
The released girls will face severe challenges, said Fatima Akilu, a psychologist who used to run a government deradicalization program for Boko Haram members and worked on a plan for reintegrating the Chibok girls in the event of their rescue. Previously released captives have been treated with suspicion or even shunned, she said.
“Coming out of captivity, there’s often a sense of helplessness, a sense of bewilderment, and really being overwhelmed at coming back at a society that’s changed and a society where you have changed,” Dr. Akilu said. “The women and girls who coming back are not the same, and they have to adjust to the changes they have endured.”
Watch in Times Video »
