By James Rupert
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, July 4, 1998; Page A19

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast, July 3 — Nigerian officials confirmed today that the country's political prisoners are to be freed and said the release of the most prominent detainee, former presidential candidate Moshood Abiola, is imminent.

The officials, who asked not to be identified, confirmed the announcement Thursday by the visiting U.N. secretary general, Kofi Annan, that all political detainees are to be freed. The releases would be a key step by Nigeria's new military leader, Gen. Abdulsalam Abubakar, toward handing power back to a civilian government, as he has pledged to do.

Abubakar took power last month after the death of Gen. Sani Abacha and has shown signs of ending the repressive military rule that has left Nigerians alienated from their government and the country isolated by foreign criticism and sanctions.

"Chief Abiola has been asked to prepare his bags and tidy up his things," a senior government official told the Reuters news agency in Nigeria's capital, Abuja. "We cannot give an exact time for his release, but it is fair to say it will be very soon and there will be an official announcement."

Officials confirmed Annan's statement that Abiola had negotiated his freedom by giving up his claim to be president of Nigeria, which was based on his apparent victory in a 1993 election aborted by the military. Those reports appear to be dividing the civilian democracy movement that has been fighting for Abiola's release and an end to military rule.

Ethnic Yorubas, who dominate southwestern Nigeria and form a powerful segment of the democracy movement, questioned whether Abiola, a Yoruba, really could have negotiated away his claim to power while still in detention.

"There is no way Abiola can renounce the mandate without even seeing his family or political associates," said a statement by the National Democratic Coalition, an important, and Yoruba-dominated, opposition group. The coalition "and the 14 million voters who voted for him in 1993 cannot be a party to this so-called renunciation," the group said in a statement issued in Lagos.

Northern, Hausa-speaking ethnic groups have predominated in the military governments that have ruled Nigeria for 28 of 38 years, and Yorubas say they have been kept out of the country's political life.

But less militant Yorubas and other ethnic groups within the democracy movement appeared unconcerned at Abiola's reported surrender of a mandate that many see as impossible to achieve now, opposition sources said. "Many people feel comfortable with Abiola coming out of prison to join the rest of the civilian opposition" in negotiating with the military a return to elected, civilian rule, said Emma Ezeazu, head of an advocacy group called Democratic Alternative.

The government offered no word on how many prisoners it is planning to release. There is no authoritative count of Nigerian political prisoners.

"The matter is with the [commander in chief] and we should allow him time to make his decision. I think that's the best thing," said Information Minister Ikeobasi Mokelu.