31st December, 2015
Ahmad Salkida, a Dubai-based Nigerian journalist, with links to Boko Haram said today that the 219 schoolgirls captured 626 days ago, are still alive.
He was reacting to President Muhammadu Buhari’s statement on Wednesday that the Federal Government was clueless about the whereabouts of the girls, or whether they are still alive.
“Most of the Chibok girls, whether they are split into groups or not, are alive”, Salkida revealed this today in an article published on his blog Salkida.com.
He said if President Buhari wants video evidence of the girls existence, “he can receive it today, that’s if he hasn’t already. If the President wants the captor of innocent Nigerian citizens and school girls to put them on the phone with their parents, he can have it done, except if he doen’t want to. He has the might as the president. So why is he saying he has no clue about the state of the girls?”
He said his position is hinged on information provided him by “multiple credible sources’.
The journalist also hinted about the recalcitrance of some of the Chibok girls to convert to Islam or be married forcefully to the insurgents.
“I am confident that Chibok girls and other captives can return to their families if government is half as strong-willed as some of the girls in captivity that have refused to be married out or give up their faith. The girls would have never backed out of any process, no matter how irritating it is.”.
Salkida criticised President Muhammadu Buhari’s approach on negotiating with Boko Haram to freeing the Chibok girls, saying government is ”living in a bubble”.
In his view the attitude that government cannot exchange Boko Haram prisoners for the girls has been demolished by such swaps in other climes, such as the US releasing five Taliban leaders held at Guatanamo Bay Prison, for Sgt Bowe Bergdahl held in Afghanistan or Cameroon releasing Boko Haram militants for a French family captured by the group in 2013.