TheCable

Lai Mohammed, minister of information and culture, has asked the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to hold its peace over its criticism of the swap deal that led to the freedom of 82 Chibok girls from Boko Haram captivity.

The Ahmed Markafi faction of PDP had described the deal as a setback to the fight against insurgency in the north-east and country as a whole.

The party said many of the insurgents would find their way to “terrorist camps” and resume their attacks.

But in a statement on Monday, Mohammed said the Buhari administration had promised to do all it could to get the girls released.

Mohammed said it was clear that the PDP had disdain for human life which it “exhibited in its incautious statement”.

He said it took the PDP government eternity to acknowledge the abduction, and by that time that could have been used in rescuing the girls was lost.

“In his inaugural address, President Muhammadu Buhari said the administration cannot claim to have defeated Boko Haram without rescuing the Chibok girls. He also said this government will do all it can to rescue them alive,” the statement read.

“If that includes swapping some Boko Haram elements for the girls, so what? Will the PDP rather have the girls stay in perpetual captivity, just to prove a ludicrous point?

“Didn’t super power United States engage in negotiations with the Taliban that led to the exchange of five Taliban fighters for US Army Sgt Bowe Bergdahl in 2014? Didn’t Israel release 1,027 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for one Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, in 2011?

“A lot of factors come into play when a nation has to decide whether or not to engage in prisoner/hostage swap. None, however, trounces the sanctity attached to human life and the consideration for the pains of the loved ones of those involved

“Since the PDP failed – as it did in everything – to rescue even one of the Chibok girls, the party should hold its peace while this administration continues to seek the release of all the abducted girls, using every means at its disposal, in addition to working assiduously to end all Boko Haram hostilities.”