A plea for the FORGOTTEN SCHOOLGIRLS of Chibok

All but forgotten now are the imprecations that roiled the social media in the wake of the abductions, when millions of people came to understand the depths to which Boko Haram – whose name means “non-Islamic education is sinful” – was willing to descend. Long disused is the hashtag “BringBackOurGirls”, contrived to stir public antipathy towards an organisation that was later so swift to declare allegiance with the murderous Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

To be sure, we have witnessed a litany of other terrorist atrocities in the intervening two years, each in turn commanding the headlines and the strategy planning, but a chilling recent report from the United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (Unicef) has rightly turned the spotlight back on the case of those unfortunate schoolgirls.

The report, titled “Beyond Chibok”, confirms that most of the girls are still “missing”, their whereabouts purportedly unknown – though they are known to be the victims of suffering beyond the imagination of any moral person. Boko Haram uses them as suicide bombers, it says. Almost one in five of its suicide attacks are carried out by children, more than two-thirds of whom are girls. “Boys are forced to attack their own families to demonstrate their loyalty to Boko Haram, while girls are exposed to severe abuse including sexual violence and forced marriage to fighters,” Unicef claims. “Some are also used to carry or detonate bombs.”

Those who do manage to escape face fresh difficulties on their return home, tainted by the stigma of having been raped while in captivity. Some return home pregnant, fostering suspicions that mother and infant are part of 

 plot to spread the evil of Boko Haram. The report says the group has abducted more young women and girls since the Chibok incident and has even stepped up its attacks on schools. It says 2.3 million people have been displaced by fighting as Nigerian troops hunt down Boko Haram.

The hideous spectre of young girls being kidnapped and turned into sex slaves and combatants also haunts neighbouring countries, such as Cameroon, where citizens are indiscriminately killed during abduction raids on rural villages. 

Surely the horror of eight-year-old girls being forcibly taken from their families, conditioned to obey military orders without question and trained to carry out suicide bombings is the most appalling of all crimes against humanity unleashed in the guise of Islam.

Putting an end to it is a responsibility that falls squarely on the security forces across the region, and yet accusations are rife that the governments are not doing enough. The international community responded to the Chibok atrocity with promises of monetary aid and military hardware, and even if those pledges have not been entirely fulfilled, the money and guns that have arrived have clearly done nothing to stymie the cruel ambitions of Boko Haram.

As tempting as it is to suggest foreign military intervention, beyond just shipments of equipment, the Nigerian government of Muhammadu Buhari must find its own way to restore peace and order in a deeply conflicted land. 

Buhari, who originally held power for two years following a coup in 1983, succeeded Jonathan Goodluck as president in a democratic election 13 months ago. Once a staunch supporter of Sharia law and empathetic to Boko Haram, he now calls himself a “democratic convert”, and was in fact the target of a Boko Haram bomb in 2014 that left 82 people dead. So Buhari of all people should realise the necessity of stopping this menace. Perhaps, with the fresh Unicef assessment, the world will apply renewed pressure for action and results.