‘I got whipped regularly for refusing to marry an insurgent’
Recently, about 700 abductees of Boko Haram from the Islands of the Lake Chad, who had remained in the captivity of the insurgents for about a year as ‘slaves’, undergoing gory tortures and carrying out hard labour, were rescued by troops of Operation Laf
Daily Trust: How were you captured by the insurgents?
Rabi Mohammed: On the day they attacked Bohol, adjacent our village, we heard them shooting sporadically. We, therefore, immediately warned ourselves that the insurgents could not be trusted. We warned our husbands and all our other males to flee immediately, leaving only the women. They heeded, but as fate would have it, their flight seemed a bit too late, because as they were fleeing, they were ambushed.
They killed some of our men and caught others. But a large population of our men successfully fed to Monguno; that was before the insurgents captured Monguno. That was how my husband and seven of my children were able to flee, while the youngest two remained with me. The insurgents trapped me and these two children at Masaram. They told us, all women: ‘We will not kill you; we will go with you as our slaves’. So they herded us.
DT: This means your husband was not captured with you. Where is he now? Rabi: At Baga. He was a trader running a shop; but he was also a commercial motorcycle rider (Kabu-Kabu), and also operates a grinding machine for commercial purposes. He visits me regularly. DT: Back to your capture: Where did the insurgents take you to? Rabi: They herded us with whips, whipping those of us they regarded as recalcitrant. They took us to Doron Jukunawa near Monguno. That was where they gathered in a forest.
They forcefully married some of us to themselves, while maintaining the others they did not forcefully marry as servants of their wives. We were fetching water and firewood, preparing meals and do all other household chores for their wives. The obstinate among us who would run errands and do such chores for their wives would be given 100 lashes. DT: Were they permanently around you?
Rabi: No, they often went attacking other villages. Whenever they captured a particular town or village, packing all the food items they met there as spoils of war, they would carry them to the enclave, and we ‘slaves’ would be the ones to mill the grains. They would carry our children on horseback whenever they went raiding other towns and villages. Any town or village captured by them, it would be the duty of these children to set the town or village ablaze. This was how we lived for about a year until the day soldiers rescued us.
I was punished severely for my refusal to get remarried to an insurgent. I occasionally received 100 lashes; although, sometimes, they gave me 15, 20 or any number they wished; but initially, I received 100 lashes, in their effort to make me succumb to their wish. I remained completely obstinate, resolving that, than get unlawfully remarried to an insurgent, I would rather be killed. DT: How did you feel, the day you saw soldiers coming to rescue you?
Rabi: I was overwhelmed by joy to the point that the two children I told you were captured with me slipped out of my presence; I have still not found them. I was elated that soldiers had come to our rescue, but my children are missing.
The insurgents were on trees when they beheld the soldiers advancing. We, the rescued, raised up veils and our hands to convince the soldiers that we had no IEDs on us, as we approached them in a long file. The soldiers then advised us to gather a location, a safe distance aside to avoid being hit by RPGs from either sides. We complied. That was how we avoided being hit by any RPG. That was how we eventually got completely rescued and conveyed en masse to Monguno.
We were more than the reported 700, as during stampede leading to our rescue, some of us fled to different directions, out of fear that they could be dumped for a very long time at the military barracks; so they preferred fleeing in search of their relations to stay with them in a freer environment. This is how many of us fled to their individual improvised rescue.
DT: Have you contemplated returning to that Lake Chad vicinity, and peacefully resettle with your family? Rabi: The insurgents are still around in the region. Only if troops are massively deployed there, occasionally combing the bush to combat the insurgents, would there be peace and security for anyone to settle there. DT: What if your husband decides that you return there? Rabi: I don’t see him making that decision soon, because right now he has brought my seven children, with whom he fled, to me. He has even contacted the Bulama (leader) of the IDPs in the camp, who has allocated a house to me to live with the children. He will remain at Baga, doing his Kabu-Kabu business. As for the other two children missing, I don’t know where they are, and it is traumatizing.