Living Islam

Ms. Hassana Adamu, then 18, was among the more than 200 girls stolen from their school dormitory in the middle of the night on April 14, 2014.

“I want the government to assist me with good things,” she told me. “I want to go back to school and to have a better life,” says Ms. Hassana Adamu.

Ms Adamu got “married” to a Boko Haram fighter about two years into her “captivity” – many of the girls felt they had little choice – and her so-called husband is among the many militants that have surrendered to the Nigerian government in the past year, following intensified anti-terror operations by the military. The Nigerian military stated that 7,000 jihadists surrendered during one week in March alone.

Ms Adamu and her “husband” spent about five months in Maidugiri, the Borno state capital, in separate sections of a camp for repentant Boko Haram fighters and their wives. Afterwards, she and her two children were sent home to her parents in Chibok while the man returned to his family in the north-eastern border town of Banki.

“It was not a real marriage,” she said. “I want a better life for myself and my children. I am never going back to him.”

Mr Yakubu Nkeki (the chairman of the missing girls’ parents association) worries that the government’s apparent loss of interest in the Chibok girls could mean that the 109 still missing may never be reunited with their families, even if they are or can be rescued.

Ms Adamu believes that she is entitled to the same opportunities as her classmates. If nothing else, she wants to be included in the scholarship scheme at the AUN (American University of Nigeria).

“It worries me so much because we started the suffering together but the other girls have become like American people while I am at home taking care of babies,” she said.

By Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani | April 17,2022 | BBC News – Africa https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-61092882

I’m sad my sisters are still in captivity, says

rescued Chibok girl Grace Dauda

Tracing the history of the Chibok abduction, which has since gained global acclaim, with even the Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) movement having branches across continents, Coordinator of Bring Back Our Girls (Lagos), Habiba Balogun, said “276 girls were abducted, 57 jumped out of the bus as they were being taken away; government negotiated the release of 82 and later another 21 girls. A few others also escaped or were liberated by the army, but there are still 109 Chibok girls in captivity, whose families are still crying, still begging God for them to be released.”

She said all Nigerians are now a metaphor for Chibok girls, stressing that the series of abductions and attacks, including the recent Kaduna-Abuja train bombing and abduction more than underline this.

In an attempt to capture the trauma parents of the yet to be released girls are going through, Balogun said, “If your child is dead, she is dead, but for her to be missing, that is a nightmare. And to even know that your child is in the hands of people who are not kind, to know that your child is in a condition that nobody would pray to be in; in a forest, with no shelter, no clean water, no regular food, and subject to God knows what, is something you don’t want to imagine.”

April 17, 2022 The Nation https://thenationonlineng.net/im-sad-my-sisters-are-still-in-captivity-says-rescued-chibok-girl-grace-dauda/