Dirty Diamonds Of Boko Haram Part 1 (12 page)

So many refugees but no food or shelter. So
many on the move but nowhere to go. It hadn’t been this bad when he
was up here but then no major city or town had fallen to the
terrorists then.

The journey lasted nearly four hours and no
one did any real talking.

Once in Maiduguri, they dropped off the
passengers and headed for the safe house.

Looking out the window at the city, Alex saw
that apart from the increased military presence, nothing had
changed in the six months since he was last there. The people were
going about their business normally, shops and offices were open,
motor parks and public vehicles were in business, crowds of people
were even in the market places and along the roads, this was how it
was here.

Once or twice, every now and then, there
would be open gun battles on the streets or bomb explosions would
rock a part of the city and litter the area with dismembered body
parts and horribly mutilated dead bodies, everyone would go running
for cover but the very next minute, once things quietened again,
they would be out again and back in business like nothing happened.
The fact that the city endured very long periods of blackout
because it had been cut off from the national power grid long ago
didn’t affect business too much, even the university stayed open no
matter what.

The Army, the police and the civilian JTF,
armed male and female vigilantes, sweated blood day and night to
keep the city safe, Alex knew this from firsthand experience, but
the devilish tactics employed by the terrorists of using women and
children as bombs was simply too mind bending and impossible to
tackle, and this the residents seemed to understand pretty
well.

They finally got to the safe-house at about
three o’clock. It was in one of the better parts of the city, a
nice bungalow surrounded by a high barbed wire topped fence and
gates which Mr. Danjumma got down to unlock for the Hilton to drive
through into the spacious compound.

The house looked like it had been hired
specifically for their temporary stay, there were enough rooms to
go around but only the most basic furnishing. A simple plastic
chair and a thin new mattress on the tiled floor were present in
three of the four room which had already been designated for Alex,
Samuel and Rufai, in the wardrobes were their Army officers’
camouflage uniforms. The two sergeants were to share the fourth
room that had two mattresses on the floor. In the kitchen was a big
fridge, stuffed with frozen ready-to-eat meal packs and a microwave
oven to heat them up. In the big living room was a round dining
table for four but it looked more like a conference table because
of the large tactical maps of the state on the wall close by. A
simple furniture cupboard with glass panels was against one wall to
another side of the living room and visible through the glass were
bottles of wine and glasses in one section, first aid equipment in
the other.

Mr. Danjumma unlocked the door to a dark room
he called the ‘storeroom’ and there were all the equipment they
would use, weapons, ammunition, all neatly arranged in rows atop
cheap wooden tables. A solid looking metal safe, about the size of
a small fridge, was there in one corner.

Mr. Danjumma wasted no time hanging around.
Once he showed them all around the house and turned on the big
generator that supplied electricity, he handed over the keys to
Rufai and took off with his driver in the Hilton for his own
lodgings at a hotel.

Samuel had his men secure the compound and
check out the two vehicles parked there while he joined Alex and
Rufai in the storeroom.

With the bright white lights now on, the
three men could see well enough to examine all the weapons and
equipment in the storeroom and they were completely to their
satisfaction. Rufai hid his moves very well as he dialed the
combination lock on the safe to get it open but once he took out
their military documents they all checked it out together.
Everything was in perfect order and very genuine. Samuel whistled
softly when he saw the high-powered stamps and accompanying
signature on them then whistled again when he saw the neat piles of
dollar bills in the black briefcase Rufai handed over to Alex. The
envelope containing the message transcripts was there in the
briefcase and so also was a nice new android phone with a big
screen. The money was complete and everything was as the Alhaji
said it would be, twenty wads of fifty dollar bills, fifty thousand
dollars each, one million dollars in all.

Completely satisfied with everything, they
put it all back in the safe again, leaving Alex only with the
transcripts, the phone and its charger. Rufai relocked the safe and
they moved out into the living room to plan.

After studying the wall maps together for
some time, Alex left Samuel and Rufai to update it with the new
information provided by Mr. Danjumma’s Army contact and went to sit
at the dining table to check out the message transcripts and the
phone.

The message transcripts weren’t much, just
three computer printed pages, less than two thousand words. Alex
read through it fast, and then he knew exactly where to pick things
up with the terrorists. Having already switched on the phone, he
picked it up and checked it. There was just one number in the
phone’s directory but nine pictures in the gallery. The pictures
were all of the same person. A young woman.

A young Arab woman.

“Rufai, there’s some sort of mistake here.
The pictures on this phone are that of an Arab woman” Alex held up
the phone for him to see.

Rufai glanced at the phone. “Yes, that’s her.
Her mother is pure breed Shuwa Arab while her father is Hausa. She
looks a lot like her mother”

Samuel stepped closer to take a better look
then whistled softly. He flipped through the pictures a bit.

“Wow!” he said softly in awe. “She’s
stunning! And she’s loaded!”

‘Stunning’ and ‘loaded’ cut it just right,
thought Alex.

The girl was a lush bodied beauty in her mid
to early-twenties. Most of her features were Arab but there was
much African in the mold of her body. Her flawless beautiful skin
was a wonderful golden high yellow in complexion, very smooth and
silky looking. Her long straight black hair reached down almost to
her waist, lovely liquid black eyes radiated intelligence and an
inner fire, luscious lips very full and inviting. Every feature of
her lovely face was clearly Arab except for her small mouth, the
red lips was too full. Those lips and her rich curvy body, that was
where the African in her blood showed all too clearly. Arab women
had thinner lips and they simply didn’t have well-defined, rich
curvy figures like these, only black African women did, and that
was the ‘loaded’.

The girl was tall and big in build with a
well-endowed curvy body that was nothing short of sheer perfection
and magnificence rolled into one.; she had big breasts, flat
stomach and very narrow waist but big widespread hips, wide sizable
backside and thick shapely thighs.

Rufai didn’t seem at all interested in the
pictures or the girl. He put the last positional markings on the
map with the thin marker and moved to take a chair at the
table.

“It’s time contact the terrorist” he said as
he sat down facing Alex.

Samuel took a chair too and they were all
seated at the dining table together. Alex put the call through to
the terrorist and as the line began to ring, he put the phone on
speaker and placed it on the table before him so they could all
listen in.

The call was soon answered.

“Ello” came a hard, heavily accented
voice.

“Allah’s peace be with thee” said Alex in
English.

“Who iz zis?” asked the voice.

“I’m the promised negotiator for the
girl”

There was a long moment of silence and then
another person came on.

“You have the money?” asked the new voice in
clear English.

“One million US dollars, yes, I do. But I
need to know that the girl is still alive and unharmed”

“Do you want me to cut off some of her
fingers so you can hear her scream?”

“No, no, that certainly won’t be necessary”
said Alex quickly. “Just send me some pictures and a short video of
her or even better let me hear her talk”

There was a pause and then a sharp command in
Arabic.

“I’m fine, uncle” came a woman’s frightened
voice.

Alex’s trained ears and brain didn’t pick out
any critical pitches to the feminine voice which could suggest its
owner was in pain. He glanced quickly at Rufai seated directly
across the table form him and lifted an eyebrow.

Rufai nodded. It was the girl.

“You heard her?” asked the voice.

“Yes, I did, thank you. When and where do I
bring you your money and take her?”

“Tomorrow morning, ten o’clock. You come to
the NNPC filling station in Bama”

“That could be a problem” said Alex at once.
“Due to the fighting in Bama the Army has practically sealed off
the bridge over the Yedzaeam river. You people already own
everything south of the river and I’m in Maiduguri right now, why
don’t we meet somewhere along the river and do business? Crossing
over at any point shouldn’t be a problem for you”

The voice snorted. “You are supposed to be
military, infidel, find a way to get yourself and the money past
all the problems and obstacles in your way and down to Bama
tomorrow morning. That is the only way you can get the girl. Come
in only one vehicle and approaching our lines at any point make
sure you have a large piece of white cloth tied to your windshield
wipers so it is clearly visible and keep every single one off your
lights on, the interior lights, the headlamps, the tail lights and
the transfigures, all of them. That is how you will be recognized
as negotiators and given safe passage through our lines and through
our territory to meet with me. How you come or from which
direction, that’s your problem, just be on time, I’m not a man that
likes to be kept waiting”

“I need some solid guarantees of safety” said
Alex. “One million dollars is a lot of money to carry around in a
war zone where everyone is armed and crazy”

“Worry about your safety while you are on
your side not on ours, we are not thieves here. As I said before,
once your vehicle approaches our front lines at any point with the
visible white cloth and the flashing lights, you will be recognized
as negotiators at once and let through unharmed and unbothered.
Mentioning the name of El Soldat is your guarantee of safety
anywhere in our territory. An escort will follow you from whichever
point you cross over down to our meeting place, and then back out
again. Bring the money to me tomorrow morning and you will have
your girl”

The line went dead.

Samuel had gotten to his feet and gone over
to look at the map again. There was a worried expression on his
face as he turned to the other two seated men, pointing at the
map.

“The only NNPC station in the region is right
on the Maiduguri-Bama road to the southern part of the city” he
said. “They’re pulling us deep into their territory”

Alex sat back in his chair. “That was what I
was talking about at the warehouse. You didn’t really think El
Soldat would come waltzing up here to make the exchange with
heavily armed soldiers crawling all over the place, did you? We are
damned lucky he didn’t invite us to Sambisa forest to spend time
with General Shekau for a day or two”

“This could be a trap” insisted Samuel,
coming back to sit down at the table.

“Or a legitimate exchange” said Rufai calmly.
“Alex has a point. They are all criminals that are high up on the
military’s wanted list and as such they will never come anywhere
near government held territory in a hundred years. We must go to
them”

Alex spoke. “Just before we left Abuja, I
made some very discreet enquiries from a few old friends of mine
over at Military Intelligence and found out that Boko Haram are now
leaning fully into the kidnapping business. Their prime targets are
families of the rich and powerful who they secretly kidnap in far
lying cites and cart away to their strongholds. Faced with the
weakness of the military, their victims are only too willing to
meet their ransom demands and so far, Boko Haram have proven to be
very discreet and straightforward in all negotiations for the
release of the hostages, which is why the general public hasn’t
heard a thing about it. Usually military negotiators quietly go
into Boko Haram territory to meet with their top men, once an
agreement is reached and the ransom is paid, the hostages are
released unharmed and everyone goes home safely. There hasn’t been
a single hint of foul play in these transactions till date and
their customary requirement for direct contact is that the incoming
negotiators announce their presence in their territory by
displaying the traditional sign of a truce, the white cloth or flag
on their vehicle and also keeping all the lights on at all
times”

“So they’ve been doing this for some time?”
asked Samuel in surprise. “It’s all normal business routine to
them?”

“Yes” said Alex. “And I think Rufai here and
the big boss back in Abuja already know that, which is why they
were so willing to embark on this mission in the first place”

Samuel turned to look at Rufai but the older
man wasn’t bothered in the least. He looked thoughtful.

“That second voice that spoke clear English,
that was very odd” said Rufai, frowning. “Those animals are
supposed to be complete illiterates and haters of western ways” he
looked at Alex. “Was that El Soldat?”

“Yeah, that was him. He’s ex-Algerian Special
Forces so he’s about the only one that speaks good English among
them”

Rufai looked shocked. “
He was Algerian
Special Forces
?”