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Chibok LGA Faces Extinction, as Abducted Girls Remain in Captivity

Chibok has never remained the same since the unfortunate incident as almost 6 years later; the people continue to grapple with the seemingly endless wait for the return of more than 100 schoolgirls who remain in Boko Haram custody.

Most had never heard of the town in the south of Borno state called Chibok before the night of 14th April 2014 when 276 schoolgirls were abducted by Boko Haram.

Chibok has never remained the same since that unfortunate incident as almost 6 years later; the people continue to grapple with the seemingly endless wait for the return of more than 100 schoolgirls who remain in Boko Haram custody.

In the first frantic minutes of their ordeal, 57 girls managed to jump from the trucks in which they were transported and escaped. The remaining 219 were taken away by the fighters. Over the years, about 164 girls have been found or released as part of a deal between the Nigerian government and the armed group.

Members of the Chibok community have now revealed that they are being targeted for ‘annihilation’ by the Boko Haram. While Buhari goes from ‘defeating’ Boko Haram to been ‘surprised’ by their activities, Chibok continues to face attacks from the terrorists.

President of the Kibaku Area Development Association, Dauda Iliya says:

“We wish to cry out and put it on the record that we are being targeted for attacks and annihilation, whether at home or wherever we are. Our people and homelands are in danger. Our homes, farms, barns, and places of worship are destroyed. We are unable to exercise our religious freedoms as we prefer. Our very existence is under grave threat”

The group revealed specific attacks on the community less than a month ago.

“On Christmas eve last year, Kwarangilum (nearby community) was attacked by Boko Haram which led to the kidnap of five persons, burning down of houses, and carting away of herds of live cattle, sheep, goats, and chickens.

“Five days later on the 29th of December in Mandaragrau, 17 Chibok indigenes were kidnapped. Such has been the reports coming in from that community in five weeks since the 24th of December 2019,” Iliya said.

The group added that the Government Secondary School, Chibok remains closed and abandoned despite efforts to reopen it.

“Despite global efforts to renovate, rehabilitate and reopen their school, Government Secondary School, Chibok (to defeat the terrorists’ objective) through the Safe Schools Initiative which was initiated by the then UN Special Envoy for Global Education, Gordon Brown, in May 2014, following the attack, it has been abandoned and remains closed as an abandoned project, to this day,” Iliya added.

The community also accused President Buhari of failing to fulfil the promise he made to them in January 2016, to set up a panel that will ‘further investigate’ the abduction of the Chibok girls. It revealed that at least 20 parents of the abducted school girls have died from trauma and violence since the tragedy.

“11 were killed during the Boko Haram attacks, eight died of heart conditions as a result of trauma, with those alive subsisting with various degrees of heart conditions and trauma along with their resultant effects…they have no knowledge on their daughters’ whereabouts or information from the federal government on when they will be rescued and brought home or if there is an ongoing effort at all,” Iliya added.

Media director of the group, Manasseh Allen said they have reached out to the presidency on several occasions “and have been ignored.”

Sadly, media reports, local and international attention has died down as the girls remain in Boko Haram custody 6 years later and many more have been abducted.Will these girls and others in captivity ever be reunited with their loved ones?

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