Chibok girls freed in Nigeria tell of servitude and starvation
- by Leah Brady
- in Worldwide
- — Oct 18, 2016
Following the release of 21 out of over 200 schoolgirls kidnapped in 2014 from their school in Nigeria, a faction of the militant group Boko Haram may be willing to free more.
According to the spokesman of the Nigerian presidency, negotiations are underway for the release of at least 83 more girls.
The father of one of the released Chibok Girls has said that his daughter, Deborah Jafaru, who came back with a child, was pregnant before her abduction.
Negotiations may have been complicated by a leadership struggle within Boko Haram, where the Islamic State group has named a new leader to replace Shekau, who insists he is still in charge.
"There is something they want, and they've given us 21 [captives] to taste what it's like to have some of the girls back, and of course whet the appetite of the parents", Nwaubani says.
"They've just become like skeletons", said Ms Yana Galang, a mother of a still-missing girl and a community leader of the Chibok parents.
Mohammed added that negotiations are underway for the release of the other Chibok girls in captivity, but warned Nigerians against unguarded statements that could truncate the rescue efforts.
On Sunday, the girls spoke of their ordeals, from a lack of food to dodging the bombs of airstrikes carried out by the Nigerian government against Boko Haram.
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"We had no food for one month and 10 days but we did not die". But it appears that some of the girls may have died in captivity.
This claim has also been rejected by Nigerian authorities.
Earlier this year, Boko Haram split into two factions after its leader Abubakar Shekau was replaced with Abu Musab Al-Barnawi, former Boko Haram spokesperson. We thank God, ' she said, speaking in Hausa.
The girls were released on Thursday, but it took several days for all of their families to reach Abuja from the remote northeastern town of Chibok. After they were released after nearly two years of captivity in the Sambisa forest, the militants had them choose whether to join the group and marry the militants, or become slaves.
Dozens of girls escaped from the militants in the first few hours after the kidnapping.
"We see this as a credible first step in the eventual release of all the Chibok girls in captivity".
One factor is surely the pressure being applied by the government and the new Nigerian president, Muhammadu Buhari, elected a year ago having promised to "crush" the terrorist organisation. They were among almost 300 girls taken from their Christian school by the Islamist militants, who have been waging a seven-year war of separation.
