UN gives top prize to Chibok girls negotiator

A Nigerian lawyer who helped secure the release of more than 100 schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram was on Monday awarded one of the UN’s top prizes.

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said Zannah Mustapha was given the annual Nansen award for his “crucial mediating” role as well as his work helping children affected by the long-running conflict.

Last year’s recipients of the award were more than 2,000 volunteers who saved the lives of migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to Europe.

Mustapha said the award was unexpected but he was “exceedingly happy” to have been chosen. “I look forward to being a worthy ambassador ... for such a noble award,” he said.

Mustapha set up The Future Prowess Islamic Foundation School 10 years ago, which has since proved a lifeline for children in conflict-riven and impoverished northeast Nigeria.

The primary school has grown from having just 36 children and a single classroom to 540 pupils – more than half of them girls – and four times as many on the waiting list.

Last year, a second school was opened near the first in the Borno state capital, Maiduguri, providing free education to 88 pupils displaced from their homes by the violence.

“This is the place where every child matters, no matter what their religion, background or culture... Our aim is to make positive changes in their lives,” he told the UNHCR.

Mustapha is a well-known figure in northeast Nigeria having previously represented the family of Mohammed Yusuf, the founder of Boko Haram who died in police custody in 2009.