hen they heard gunshots on 1 April 2022, the Kurebe people of Shiroro in Niger State ran out of their homes. They saw menacing men emerging from Hudawa, a thick forest in the neighbouring Kaduna State, and marching along the community’s untarred roads.
Mr Husaini said he pleaded with the terrorists to pay a ransom but they declined, offering to pay him the girl’s bride price instead. Boko Haram, a violent extremist group notorious for preaching against western education and lifeways, is spreading its gospel and tentacles across Nigeria and the southern edges of the Sahel. Deeply rooted in north-east Nigeria, its birthplace, the Islamic extremists have infiltrated the north-west and north-central states to further spread their campaigns of terror and radicalism.
“Any female child that is up to 12 years old should be married off,” the jihadist was quoted to have said. “Up till now, some of our boys and girls are still missing,” Yusuf Saidu, Kurebe’s district head, told PREMIUM TIMES. “They marry the girls and sometimes even come to pay dowries to their parents.”r Saidu had been ruling by proxy since he was uprooted from the community by the terrorists. When PREMIUM TIMES tracked him down earlier this year for an interview, he gave testimonies of tears on how Boko Haram terrorists were recruiting their boys and raping their girls, including his granddaughter.
When the terrorists set ablaze the only school in Kurebe last year, Mr Umar said he was bitter because the community had been devoid of basic amenities such as public healthcare. However, like in Kurebe, nearly 5,000 classrooms have been razed in the protracted armed conflict, the United Nations Children’s Fund said in a statement earlier this year.