Boko Haram’s Abducted Girls

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Boko Haram

Fifteen year old, Mummy Ibrahim, was forced to flee her home in Maiduguri, Nigeria after her neighbor pledged his allegiance to Boko Haram and claimed he was going to forcefully take Mummy as his bride. Mummy fled to Yola, Nigeria where the United Nations had set up a refugee camp for women and children that were forced to flee from the terrorist organization. Today, the Yola refugee camp hosts up to 1.5 million displaced women and children.

Ms. Power, United States ambassador to the United Nations, visited Yola and met with eight of the “Chibok girls” who has escaped from Boko Haram after the April 2014 kidnapping. In 2014, Boko Haram militants abducted 276 girls from their elementary school and while 57 later escaped; the remaining 219 girls have not been found. On December 15th, 2015, CNN received a “Proof of Life” video of 15 “Chibok Girls”. This video was the first sign of hope for parents that some of the abducted girls may still be alive years after their kidnapping.

For the girls that have managed to escape from Boko Haram’s control, returning home does not always offer the warm welcome that one would expect. As African governments make military advancements against the Islamic extremist group and rescue some of the enslaved girls, the abducted girls of Boko Haram now face the challenge of rehabilitation. Once they return to home, the girls are often stigmatized and ostracized by their communities. The communities fear that these “Boko Haram wives” transformed into violent, radical terrorists during their stay with the terrorist organization. Many communities believe that the schoolgirls were kidnapped by Boko Haram in order to kill for them and therefore suspect escaped Boko Haram girls to be suicide bombers. Because of this, the most vulnerable population of abducted schoolgirls are now also becoming the most feared. The victims of the kidnapping are being viewed as suspicious by their home communities and it is imperative that this narrative changes in order to provide the kidnapped girls the protection that they so desperately need.

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