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NIGERIA HAS TODAY marked the first anniversary of Boko Haram’s abduction of 219 schoolgirls from the northeastern town of Chibok, as part of a series of events planned around the world.
The commemoration and renewed calls for their release came as Amnesty International said the Islamists had kidnapped at least 2,000 women and girls since the beginning of last year.
The UN and African rights groups also called for an end to the targeting of boys and girls in the conflict, which has left at least 15,000 dead and some 1.5 million people homeless, 800,000 of them children.
The focus of the one-year commemoration was on Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, where a vigil has been held demanding the girls’ immediate release almost every day since they were kidnapped.
The kidnappings last year spurred many well known faces to back the #BringBackOurGirls campaign on social media.
The #BringBackOurGirls campaign said the Empire State Building would be lit in its colours of red and purple, to symbolise an end to violence against women.
Prayers, candlelit vigils and marches have been held or are planned and campaign group member Habiba Balogun said it was important to mark the anniversary.
“It’s wonderful that the world is remembering and… sending the message that we are not going to forget and we are not going to stop until we know what has happened to our girls,” she told AFP.
However, Nigeria’s president-elect Muhammadu Buhari today cautioned the he could not make promises on the return of 219 schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram exactly a year ago.
We do not know if the Chibok girls can be rescued. Their whereabouts remain unknown. As much as I wish to, I cannot promise that we can find them.But I say to every parent, family member and friend of the children that my government will do everything in its power to bring them home.
School stormed
Boko Haram fighters stormed the Government Secondary School in the remote town in Borno state on the evening of April 14 last year, seizing 276 girls who were preparing for end-of-year exams.
Fifty-seven escaped but nothing has been heard of the 219 others since May last year, when about 100 of them appeared in a Boko Haram video, dressed in Muslim attire and reciting the Koran.
Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has since said they have all converted to Islam and been “married off”.
The mass abduction brought the brutality of the Islamist insurgency unprecedented worldwide attention and prompted a viral social media campaign demanding their immediate release.
Nigeria’s government was criticised for its initial response to the crisis and was forced into accepting foreign help in the rescue effort after a groundswell of global outrage.
The military has said it knows where the girls are but has ruled out a rescue effort because of the dangers to the girls’ lives.
In a new report published today, Amnesty quoted a senior military officer as saying the girls were being held at different Boko Haram camps, including in Cameroon and possibly Chad.
The Chibok abduction was one of 38 it had documented since the beginning of last year, with women and girls who escaped saying they were subject to forced labour and marriage, as well as rape.
’I forgive Boko Haram’
#BringBackOurGirls organisers thanked supporters across the world, from ordinary men, women and children to public figures such as US First Lady Michelle Obama and Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai.
The girls were “the symbol for the defence of the dignity and sanctity of human life, of the girl child, women, for all those oppressed, repressed, disadvantaged, hurting, unsafe,” they said.
“We must prioritise their safe return,” they said in a statement last week.
Malala, who was shot and nearly killed by the Pakistani Taliban for advocating girls’ education, on Monday published an open letter to the Chibok girls, describing them as “my brave sisters”.
The 17-year-old criticised Nigerian and world leaders for not doing enough to help secure their release and called the girls “my heroes”.
Outgoing President Goodluck Jonathan’s government has been accused of indifference to the fate of the girls after initially trying to downplay the size of the kidnapping and even deny it had happened.
Jonathan’s election defeat last month to former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari has raised hopes of a breakthrough. He has vowed to “spare no effort” to destroy the militants.
Twenty-one of the 57 girls who escaped are currently studying at the American University of Nigeria in Yola, the capital of neighbouring Adamawa state.
They told AFP in an email exchange with university staff they were hoping to make “positive future changes, not just in Chibok, but in our country and the world”.
The kidnapped girls were in their thoughts and prayers every day, they said, but they did not blame Boko Haram foot soldiers.
“I forgive Boko Haram for what they have done and I pray God forgives them, too,” said one.
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One year on and nothing has changed , Boko Haram must be immune to hastags .
These Twitter campaigns really are pathetic.
What? Celebrities using a hashtag hasn’t worked? Maybe they need one more like on Facebook
Yeah lightning up a building should do the trick to end violence towards women!
Why didn’t someone think of this years ago?!
And let’s be honest here folks these people are piss poor from a war torn land and it gave a few celebrities the chance to pout in front of the cameras but at the end of the day nobody gives a shite about them especially the pouters. SAD BUT TRUE.
The great thing about social media is that it allows people to feel like they are helping to make a positive change in the world while actually sitting on their arse doing nothing.
Hate the trend of holding up a piece of paper with some profound and moral message on it. It’s cheesy and it doesn’t change anything. Feminism is particularly bad for it.
How many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb….? One; she just has to hold it in place and wait for the world to rotate around her!
The most powerful first lady in the world holding a sign reading, ‘bringbackourgirls’. Fantastic work Michelle.
Keep up the fight.
Should her husband send in the marines and if he did would there be 100,000 people marching in Dublin to oppose him?
Unless the social media department of Boko Harums’ conscience is deeply affected by hashtags and first ladies sad face holding placards,then i say do whatever needs to be done. I can’t see 100,000 people in their right minds marching against anything that would help save the lives of 200 kids,would you?
In 2003 roughly 100,000 people marched in Dublin to oppose the liberation of the people of Iraq.
I’d say somehow it was more to do with view that the US were invading it for their own gain rather than saving lives. Are you saying that in this case there is a march of that magnitude that nothing should be done by any foreign power capable of saving these kids lives?
The people of Nigeria should sort out the problems of Nigeria just like the people of Iraq should have been left to sort out their own problems. We should stop interfering. Who are we to say how others should live?
Thats a fantastic idea Paul. lets sit back and let this keep happening.
So should it be young men from Dublin or Detroit who do the fighting? Are you prepared to fight Eoin or should others do your bidding?
Would you say this then about Irish girls Paul?
Ireland to settle affairs without interference ie help/support from anyone else in the world seems irresponsible.
I hope that Ireland helps others too. Look at charity figures and UN forces. Good, proud service to humanity.
Women are still treated like cattle worldwide. Baby girls are circumcised so they can’t experience sexual pleasure. Yet feminism isn’t taken seriously because of the few extremists. That and the media printing stupid pointless articles about whether men or women are the better drivers which only serves to pit us against each other. Very frustrating.
Baby boys are circumcused in the millions because of religion worldwide and no feminist gives a f.ck , if feminists said no more religious mutilation of male babies penises you might not be ridiculed and supported every time you begin to whine .
Deco are you really comparing male circumcision to female circumcision? Do even the tiniest bit of research on the differences between the two
Chopping off little girls bits is a far worse crime than chopping off little boys bits. But both are wrong. When feminists start telling the Jews to stop mutilating their sons then we will have some parity of concern.
Male circumcision is primarily done on hygiene and cleanliness grounds, if anything it enhances sensations, whereas female circumcision serves no purpose other than to remove sexual pleasure.
You idiots comparing them are contrary shites
Obviously female circumcision is devastating for its victims and male circumcision is usually of little consequence to its victims. The point you are missing is that it is wrong to mutilate children and cultures who practice such barbarity are wrong. The question is are we prepared to fight and die to stop such barbarity?
Nonsense. Circumcision has nothing to do with hygiene and has always been about curbing men’s sexual desires and reducing pleasure.
As Maimonides wrote in Guide to the Perplexed;
“Similarly with regard to circumcision, one of the reasons for it is, in my opinion, the wish to bring about a decrease in sexual intercourse and a weakening of the organ in question, so that this activity be diminished and the organ be in as quiet a state as possible. It has been thought that circumcision perfects what is defective congenitally.”
All this b*llshit about AIDS is a very recent fig-leaf excuse for a practice that’s been going on for millennia. Would you do it to an adult without permission? Or a teenager? No! So stop doing it to babies.
Bollox .
And rightly so.
Violent men have taken those girls and the only chance those girls have of being freed is the use of other violent men or the realistic threat of violent men. Unless we as country are prepared to risk the lives of young Irish soldiers to free these girls then we should keep our mouths shut.
The nigerian army is beating the crap out of boko haram they wont be around for much longer .
Great then, those girls will be back home in no time. All those celebrity hashtags must have got the Nigerian generals moving. So celebs can sleep easy in their beds knowing that young Nigerian are fighting and dieing to free those girls.
The kidnappers and rapists of Boko Haram are simply adhering to the basic tenets of Islam, -
Qur’an (4:24) and Qur’an (33:50) – A man is permitted to take women as sex slaves outside of marriage. Note that the verse distinguishes wives from captives (those whom they right hand possesses).
You mean a twitter campaign didn’t rescue them? Who wooda thought?
Twitter is the new prayer. It’s there to let you feel like you’re doing something useful when in fact you’re doing absolutely nothing.
Two hands working is better than 1000 hands tweeting!
@deco Circumsised males are still ‘allowed’ feel sexual pleasure. It’s a different thing. But incidentally I don’t agree with it. You’re right @Pontious Pilate. No child should be hurt.
Twitter wont bring them back. Army action will.
The likes of these hostages are the real issue.
How about #bringbackourgirls for the girls that have been killed by US and western force during the wars of the last 10-15 years
If those girls were wealthy or white they would be back by now.
Yeah. Cause that’ll work.
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