Chibok Girls? Nigerian Military Finds Almost 300 Girls & Women in Sambisa Forest

The official Twitter account of the Nigerian military above has just put out a three-tweet series of announcement saying they have found 200 girls and 93 women in Sambisa Forest. They say they cannot officially confirm if the girls found are the same ones who were abducted from their school in Chibok community in April last year as they are yet to be profiled. My hope is that there are some of them among the group, but it is great that these women are now free! Great news! See the full tweets below...

Chibok Girls Anniversary: Female Boko Haram Abductee Trained to Fight Speaks Out

Today marks the one-year anniversary of the April 14, 2014 mass abduction by Boko Haram of almost 300 Nigerian schoolgirls in the northeastern Nigerian town of Chibok. Amnesty International has now released a report called, 'Our job is to shoot, slaughter and kill': Boko Haram's reign of terror in north east Nigeria, which is based on nearly 200 witness accounts, including 28 with abducted women and girls who escaped captivity.

The report is accompanied by a video of Boko Haram's female fighters mostly made of abducted girls and women. In the video, 19-year-old Aisha speaks of how during the months she was held captive, she was raped repeatedly, sometimes by groups of several fighters. She witnessed her sister being killed as well as up to 50 people who refused to convert or get trained. Aisha accepted to be trained to fight and was sent on an operation to attack her village. She escaped after 4 months. See the video below...

US Surveillance Planes Searching For Abducted Chibok Girls Spot Several Groups

U.S. surveillance flights over northeastern Nigeria, had twice in July showed what appeared to be large groups of girls held together in remote locations.

This has raised hopes among domestic and foreign officials that these girls are among the group that Boko Haram abducted from the Chibok boarding school in April.

According to the Wall Street Journal,

The surveillance suggests that at least some of the 219 schoolgirls still held captive haven't been forced into marriage or sex slavery, as had been feared, but instead are being used as bargaining chips for the release of prisoners.

Could Chibok Girls Be The Teenage Female Suicide Bombers Now Working For Boko Haram?

Another female suicide bomber has been reported at the Aminu Kano College of Islamic Studies this afternoon blowing herself up as students were checking results in the school. Yesterday, two female suicide bombers struck elsewhere in Kano.

The day before that, there was also a similar report, and in some of the cases, these female suicide bombers have been reported as teenagers, sometimes as young as 16!

Maybe it is time, we start putting two and two together?

Malala Yousafzai To Visit Nigeria In Support of Campaign for Missing Chibok Schoolgirls

Malala Yousafzai was shot by the Taliban when she was 14 for campaigning for Girls Education in her home country of Pakistan. 

The young activist will visit Nigeria to campaign on behalf of the girls abducted from their school by terror group Boko Haram back in April.

Her visit to Nigeria comes almost 90days since the abduction of the girls and her presence is expected to add to the pressure on the Nigerian government.

Malala also turned 17 today. Happy birthday to her. Watch her talk about the missing schoolgirls below...

Washington Post Collects Nigeria's PR Money Then Satirizes President Jonathan's Op-Ed

Last week, I posted [here] an Op-ed by President Goodluck Jonathan which originally appeared in the Washington Post under the title - Nothing is more important than bringing home Nigeria’s missing girls.

Today, that newspaper proved that the article was a paid-for PR piece when a member of their own editorial team wrote a rebuttal to Jonathan. Karen Attiah slammed the president with a satirized version of his own puff-piece which contained hard-hitting facts of ways in which his administration have missed the mark in dinding the missing girls.

There was also the revelation that the Nigeria government is paying a US PR company $100,000 monthly to launder their image internationally. What a shame!

Senator Zanna Says Chibok Girls are Being Raped on Camera and Videos Released to the Public

In an interview with Rudolf Okonkwo of Sahara Reporters, Senator Khalifa Ahmed Zanna of Borno Central said that Boko Haram members "are just raping the girls on camera and even showing them on video, releasing it to the public."

The Senator said;

Somebody told me that they were shown being raped, and in turn, it is the girl who was raped that came out kneeling down and begging the man to be patient. Do you know the reason why? They said when they rape them they shoot them. Therefore the girl after being raped, she curled down to the man, kneeling down and begging him to please be patient. So disturbing. And although I didn’t see the video, the person narrated to me, he said he had the video.

The interview was recorded on the 24th of June in New York, 70 days after the abductions, but was released today, 3rd July. See the video and the transcript below.

The United States Reveals They Still Have No Idea Where Kidnapped Chibok Girls Are

The United States through Pentagon spokesman, Rear Admiral John Kirby, reportedly admitted that US troops in Nigeria have not found out where the abducted Chibok girls are.

“We don’t have any better idea today than we did before about where these girls are, but there’s been no letup of the effort itself,” Kirby said about the search for the over 200 schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram.

He also said that the US troops had decreased their surveillance flights in Nigeria, but explained that the overall search levels were unchanged due to international involvement, as there are now more flights by other countries including UK and France.

The report insists the U.S  is unrelenting in efforts to locate and rescue the girls.

Adokiye Offering Her Virginity In Place Of Girls Kidnapped By Boko Haram - What Kind of Joke?

I shook my head when it was reported that Adokiye Kyrian, a singer, had offered up her virginity if the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram would release the 200+ school girls kidnapped from Chibok back in April. When the news went viral on social media and began to get on foreign magazine, I was like WTH? Adokiye had told Vanguard’s Showtime;

“This is 11 p.m. in the night and do you know what I am thinking about? Those little girls, where they are and what could be happening to them. It is just unfair. They are too young. I wish I could offer myself in exchange. They are between 12 and 15 year old girls for Christ sake. I am older and more experienced. Even if 10 to 12 men have to take me every night, I don’t care. Just release these girls and let them go back to their parents.”

#BringBackOurGirls: Names and Photos of Abducted Schoolgirls Published in ThisDay

The ThisDay newspaper has published the names and pictures of majority of the schoolgirls abducted from Chibok in Borno more than 2 months ago. Almost 300 girls were kidnapped from the Government Girls Secondary School (GGSS) on April 14, sparking off an international outrage.

Since then, the Nigerian government has received help from the government of other countries including the United States and United Kingdom, as well as France, China, and Isreal. However, the girls are yet to be found, with only trickles of those who have managed to escape the Boko Haram terrorists making it home.

Obasanjo Says Feedback From Boko Haram Indicate Some of the Chibok Girls Will Never Return

Olusegun Obasanjo, the former President of Nigeria, speaking on the girls kidnapped while at school about two months ago in Chibok, has expressed fears that the more than 200 abducted schoolgirls might never return again.

This is so heartbreaking and sickening to read. I'm so scared for those young girls and what they are going through, and then the parents who wake up each day without their children, and knowing the horrors they might be living through.

Obasanjo said during an interview on the Hausa Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation that Boko Haram would only probably release some of the girls that might be pregnant and finding it difficult to cater for their babies in the forest.

Chibok Girls Ill and Spread in Several Countries - Boko Haram Hostage Negotiator Reveals

There were reports earlier that some of the abducted Chibok school girls had died from snake bites and worse. Now with negotiations on-going, some are said to be very ill, while most are spread across Niger, Cameroon and Chad. This is according to Australian cleric Stephen Davis, who was hired by President Goodluck Jonathan to serve as a hostage negotiator to bring back the girls. Davis has also ruled out the possibility of the girls being released in one rescue operation.

Abubakar Shekau, Boko Haram Releases Video of Abducted Chibok Schoolgirls

The Boko Haram has released a video purportedly showing around 100 girls kidnapped from a school in Chibok last month. The girls could be seen in the video wearing the full length black and ash-coloured hijab with only their faces showing, and reciting Quranic verses.

Michelle Obama Speaks on Abducted Chibok girls in Mother's Day Address

Tomorrow is Mothers Day in the United States and first lady Michelle Obama while delivering the weekly radio address which is usually done by President Barack Obama, expressed her dismay over the kidnapping of some 200 girls in Nigeria last month.

Video Allegedly Showing Boko Haram Killing One Of The Chibok Girls Is Untrue

The Minister of State for Defence, Musiliu Obanikoro has tweeted some proof that the video allegedly showing Boko Haram members killing one of the missing Chibok schoolgirls is not genuine. The video has been published on several blogs and shows a young girl buried in a sandy hole and stoned to death.