In May 2017, the Federal Government announced the release of 82 of the 276 schoolgirls who were abducted from Government Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State, by Boko Haram insurgents on the night of April 14, 2014, bringing to 106 the total number of the schoolgirls so far rescued. That announcement triggered in me the desire to visit Chibok once again. I had been there once, in June 2014, shortly after the girls were abducted. This time around, I wanted to have an on-the-spot feel of life in Chibok three years after my first visit, get some of the freshly rescued girls to share their experiences as well as talk to some of the parents whose daughters were among the rescued girls.
My curiosity grew when I heard Peter Joseph, a relative of one of the rescued girls, say during ‘The Stream’ on Al Jazeera that the Nigerian government barred the girls from telling their parents or relatives about their experiences while in captivity. Something must be amiss, I thought. I had also confirmed from my sources in Chibok that journalists, particularly Nigerian journalists, were being prevented from entering Chibok. There and then, I made up my mind to go, only this time around not as a journalist but as a humanitarian worker, since I also head the media team of an NGO run by a religious centre.
On Thursday, June 8, having obtained the necessary clearance from my office, I packed a few personal effects into a small bag and headed to the Murtala Muhammad Airport in Lagos and into the uncertainty that awaited me in Chibok.
The journey to Chibok
The flight from Lagos to Kano took approximately 70 minutes. I arrived in Kano in the cool of the evening and headed to a hotel. The raging insurgency in Borno State in the last few years has meant there are no commercial flights into Maiduguri. Travellers to the city could fly into either Kano or Yola and complete the rest of the journey by road.
Early Friday morning, I set off to Maiduguri by road. The 600-kilometre Kano-Maiduguri journey took more than eight hours due to the incessant stops for security checks. It was also the month of Ramadan and the predominantly Muslim passengers who were observing their fast stopped at intervals to pray.
As we got into Damaturu, the capital of Yobe State, at about 5:30 pm and journeyed towards Maiduguri, I grew apprehensive. I had been hinted in Kano that vehicular and human movements were not allowed into Maiduguri once it was dark. Based on media reports, bombings have not ceased in that ancient city fondly called Yerwa by the locals since my last visit in 2014.
Between Damaturu and Maiduguri, we were again stopped by soldiers at a checkpoint and ordered to present our identity cards. Four of the passengers were undocumented Nigeriens and Cameroonians and the soldiers asked us to either wait for the foreigners to be interrogated or those in a hurry should find an alternative. But luck smiled on me when one of the soldiers stopped a private car and asked the driver to assist me to Maiduguri. Within 15 minutes we were in Maiduguri. It was about 6:20 pm.
Now safely in Maiduguri, it suddenly dawned on me that I was hungry. I had not eaten anything prior to this time. As I stepped out of the car and bade farewell to the guy who gave me a lift, I saw a kiosk with the bold inscription, ‘University of Suya’. I followed the compelling aroma and bought just enough suya and water to serve as my evening meal.
The next challenge was locating the hotel where I planned to spend the night. It was the same hotel I used during my first trip. I remembered the name of the hotel but not its location. To make matter worse, the first three tricyclists I stopped could not speak English and I, unfortunately, do not speak Hausa. The fourth one nodded when I asked if he knew the hotel, but when he began to run around the city in confusion, I knew he was totally lost. An hour later, I was still inside this tricycle without any idea how close or far we were to the hotel. It was past 9:00pm, a time in Maiduguri that only security personnel are expected to be outside.
Rather miraculously, I found another tricyclist who could communicate in English and knew the hotel as well. He tried to describe the place to us but I asked him to take me there instead. I paid off the first guy and the second took me graciously to my destination. It was 9:25pm when I got to the hotel and checked in.
By 4:00 O’clock on Saturday morning I was up, and by 6:00am I was fully ready to hit Chibok, but since movements are not allowed in Maiduguri until 7:00am, I sat back on the bed, turned on the television to know if there had been bombings in any part of Maiduguri while I slept. Unfortunately, the three channels available showed only movies. I decided on one of the movies, ‘Maximum Risk’. That title reminded me of the journey ahead of me.
I got to the park at 10:00am in a tricycle. I could have left earlier, but I did not want to reach Chibok too early for security reasons. To my greatest shock, drivers at the park told me I was late for the journey.
“This is just 10:00am. How then can I be late for a journey of not more than three hours?” I asked. “I have been to Chibok before.”
The drivers told me things had changed since my last visit. Travelling to Chibok, Damboa and Biu from Maiduguri and back is now scheduled. You either follow the schedule or forget the journey. No vehicle, whether private or commercial, goes to Damboa without security escort provided by the military, they said. Damboa is a border local government area to Chibok.
I reluctantly went back to my hotel, dropped my bag and took a tricycle round Maiduguri for sightseeing. At a glance, Maiduguri is now far less busy than it was when I visited in 2014. Business activities in the city are at their lowest ebb.
After about an hour going round the city, I went back to the hotel. The rest of the day was like a nightmare as time seemed to stand still. To pass time, I went to a beer parlour located in a police barracks just 10 minutes’ walk away from the hotel. It was 4:00pm. There, I sat like a disinterested observer and listened to police officers and soldiers as they discussed the woes bedevilling the country. To my utter dismay, some of them did not have good wishes for President Muhammadu Buhari whom they blamed for the ugly state of affairs in the country. By 7:00pm, I was back in my hotel.
When I got to the park as early as 7:25 the following morning, three vehicles were already loaded and on their way.
“Am I late again?” I asked one of the men I met the day before. I was informed that all the vehicles going to Chibok have to wait for others at a designated location. I boarded the next available car. In about 30 minutes the car was filled and we began the journey to Damboa.
A little after the car took off from the park, we got to a checkpoint mounted by the JTF (Joint Military Task Force) where our driver paid some money. I couldn’t figure out how much, but I was told the money was for escort services provided by the security forces and every vehicle plying that route must pay it.
About 15 minutes into the journey, we arrived at a place where countless private and commercial vehicles were parked and waiting. Buying and selling went on without let or hindrance. Our vehicle joined the others, we all alighted and began the long wait for military escort to Damboa. A co-traveller told me how risky it was to travel that road alone. If you are not killed by the insurgents, you risk dying in the hands of security forces who allegedly fire shots at anyone who dares to travel without escort on that route.
After nearly three hours, the security forces arrived. There were more soldiers than policemen. The vehicles filed out and ours joined too. Over a hundred vehicles were ahead of us. It was about 1:00pm.
About 20 minutes later, all the vehicles slowed down as we heard gunshots from the far front. I later learnt that the soldiers were firing at suspected Boko Haram insurgents who ran back into the desert when it became obvious they could not carry out a successful attack. I was also told the increased attacks on helpless citizens by the insurgents on the Maiduguri-Damboa road necessitated the escort approach adopted by the security forces. Remains of several bombed vehicles along the road, some of them very recent, are testimonies that trouble in this region is far from over.
Five minutes later we were on the move again. The terribly bad Maiduguri-Damboa road made the journey seem endless. When we got to Damboa nearly two hours later, the soldiers left us. The road from Damboa to Chibok is worse. Most parts of the road are like a jungle and it was easy to see why it has not been difficult for the insurgents to successfully lay ambush and kill several people on this particular road. We arrived in Chibok at about 2:00pm and I breathed a sigh of relief.
Living in Chibok
The first thing I tried to do on getting to Chibok was reach my sources there. I had lost the contact details of the fixer who assisted me when I was there in 2014, but I had other contacts whom I tried to reach. Unfortunately, network service had completely disappeared from my Etisalat and Glo lines shortly after we left Maiduguri. Calling my sources from a call centre wasn’t successful either. I was told Airtel and MTN are the only networks available in the whole of Chibok. Even then, they come in fits and starts. So, how do residents of Chibok and adjoining communities communicate with the outside world? How do they report incidents when they happen – which is frequently? I had no doubt that too many things must be going unreported.
Exasperated, I sat at the call centre hoping I would eventually see someone I could recognise. AK47-wielding soldiers, policemen and local vigilantes were a common sight. Some bore other similar weapons. Any passer-by could easily see I was a stranger. As the day grew older, more and more people looked at me suspiciously.
In my desperation, I brought out my phone and took out numbers of a friend in Lagos who hails from Borno State. He directed me to a fellow who provided me a place to stay. It was around 5:00pm when we got to his place.
Chibok economy in a shambles
The following morning, I stepped out to have a feel of life in Chibok. My first observation was the agony the people are going through due to the ban on motorcycles. I gathered that the ban came into force because motorcycles were used by the insurgents to carry out attacks. But unlike in Maiduguri where tricycles come in handy as alternatives, residents of Chibok and neighbouring communities rely on foot and bicycles for transportation.
As demand for bicycles has increased in Chibok, so has the price of an appreciably good one. Residents complain that the sellers are taking undue advantage of the increase in demand. A strong bicycle that can carry produce from the farm is sold between N20,000 and N25,000 depending on where it is bought. The only bicycles that can be bought at N10,000 or thereabouts are the sport-like ones without a carriage at the back. But farmers are not interested in this type; teachers and students are usually the ones seen riding them.
Unlike bordering local government areas that enjoy a bit of power supply once in a while, Chibok has remained in total darkness in the last two years. On November 13, 2014, Boko Haram had released a video on social media after it captured Chibok community. In that video, Boko Haram members rode on pickup trucks and motorbikes destroying mobile telecommunication masts and electricity facilities with rocket-propelled grenades while hundreds of residents fled into the bush. Although troops from the 7 Division of the Nigerian Army retook Chibok two days after it was captured by Boko Haram, the residents are still bearing the brunt of that damage done to major infrastructure in the town. Electricity cables meant to be on the poles can be seen lying idly on the ground; women have turned them to drying lines for their clothes while children use them as playthings.
True, Airtel and MTN have re-established their presence in Chibok, but they have very weak signals and near impossible internet connectivity. For electricity, its restoration in Chibok seems a far-fetched dream. Residents with the means continue to depend on their power-generating sets. They need power supply to pump water for both domestic use and for their animals, such as cows and goats. Those without alternative power supply are forced to draw water out of extremely deep wells or face dehydration. Having no petrol station in Chibok, residents have to part with a whopping N250 for a litre of petrol (Premium Motor Spirit).
“A litre of petrol here to power my generator costs N250, plus N50 for engine oil, that’s N300. How many litres of fuel am I going to buy a day and still make profits?” said Samuel Ibrahim, a computer operator in Chibok.
“It is becoming increasingly difficult for me to run this business. Now that we have no government electricity, we just pray that someone will establish a petrol station here. This will help bring the price of fuel down,” he said.
More agonizing for Chibok residents – soldiers, policemen, teachers, farmers and other civilians alike – however, is the absence of a public market. The Chibok market was first closed in 2014 after Boko Haram insurgents captured the town. Moves to reopen the market were aborted when on January 29, 2016 a Boko Haram suicide bomber blew himself up at the usually busy Wednesday market right at the centre of Chibok Local Government Area, killing 10 people and injuring about 28 others. This led the army high command to order the closure of the market in early February of that year.
The only option left to the residents is to buy their daily needs from stores and kiosks operators who, like the bicycle sellers, hold regular meetings to decide what price should be tagged on each item, a development that has further impoverished the residents.
While Nigerians in Lagos, for instance, buy a refill pack of Milo at N1,000, their compatriots in Chibok buy at N1,500. Same goes for every other item, including GSM recharge cards. Some of the residents are pleading with the concerned authorities to reopen the market.
Some retailers in Chibok say they buy their goods in Maiduguri or as far as Yola, the Adamawa State capital. A male trader said he prefers Yola, even though it’s farther, because things are cheaper and more readily available there.
Heavy military presence
Chibok has heavy military presence. The number of armed soldiers and policemen, both those at close checkpoints and those on patrol, was an early warning sign to me that the place is heavily militarised and one could pay dearly for suspicious behaviour.
At least up to the time I left Chibok, movements of residents depended on allowances provided by the army authority. Farmers going to farm, students and their teachers going to school, traders taking their products to either Damboa or Askira for sale, irrespective of their mode of transportation, must wait at the first army checkpoint for the appointed time before they are allowed to continue with their journey. It does not matter how long they have to wait, residents must demonstrate total obedience to these security rules as doing otherwise has always resulted in brutality.
I was soon to learn that these restrictions are not in any way meant to punish the residents. Even soldiers who go beyond their duty post without obtaining “a pass code” from the appropriate quarters had been seriously disciplined by the authority under the allegation of engaging in acts capable of compromising military strategy. My undercover conversations with different soldiers at different times and locations within Chibok revealed that the military high command, aware of the threat Boko Haram still poses to Chibok despite successes recorded, retained restriction of movement of both of its men and the residents as a strategy.
But despite the heavy military presence, a group of five soldiers I chatted with said the possibility of Boko Haram attacks in segments of Chibok is still very high as a result of porous borders. Each of the soldiers complained of being fed up with Chibok and desperately wanted a transfer to a new location.
“Chibok is a very difficult place to protect from Boko Haram attacks. Unlike in Adamawa State where we have successfully stopped the insurgents from attacking places like Konduga and Mubi, there are so many entry points to Chibok the insurgents can come from and do havoc,” said one of the soldiers.
“You don’t hear about attacks again in Konduga and Mubi because the entry points are in order, making them easy to defend. The only exception is Mandagali which also has a porous border challenge. But although we still hear of unserious attacks in Mandagali, entry to the town by insurgents has been halted,” said another soldier, who was interrupted by repeated calls to his cell phone.
“I know the place very well. I was one of the soldiers that secured the place back from the insurgents. But the border challenge of Chibok is far worse when compared to Mandagali. Defending Chibok has been very challenging. Let me not deceive you, my brother, Chibok is not safe from Boko Haram attacks,” he said.
When he excused himself to answer his caller, I was disappointed because he was already in the mood to tell me more without prompting.
When he left, I wondered the kind of question to ask his colleagues to keep the discussion going without arousing suspicion.
Then a thought crossed my mind.
“But what will happen if the army decides to withdraw its men from Chibok, going by the successes recorded against Boko Haram so far and also keeping in mind that there has not been any attack in Chibok since you guys retook it?” I asked.
Graciously, the responses from the soldiers not only addressed my question but further led to more revelation, particularly on the strained relationship between the soldiers and the residents.
Strained military-residents relationship
“If you are coming here to start any business, you must have a rethink. This place is not only unsafe but the residents are also uncaring. The reason you see checkpoints everywhere and restriction of movement is because the place is not safe. Chibok will be in trouble if we leave here today. Our heavy presence here is the reason they are steering clear,” said one soldier.
“My regret is that the people are taking our presence for granted. They have no respect for us. They can just walk past you on the road without greeting you and if you greet them, they will not answer you. When you go and buy food and other items in their stores, they will increase the prices because we are soldiers. Chibok people are very wicked. We can’t wait to leave here. They treat us like commoners who are here to inconvenience them,” another soldier said.
But in defence, Chibok residents who spoke to me accused the soldiers of human rights violation. They said when the soldiers first came in 2014, they were treated like kings by virtually all the residents, alleging that the new attitude towards their protectors was as a result of brutalities even their aged parents suffered in the hands of the soldiers.
One of such human rights abuses, they said, was that the soldiers at a time started beating up young residents who were playing cards under trees, accusing them of being Boko Haram members, and sometimes aged parents who came out in defence of their children were given the same treatment. They also alleged that the soldiers at a time forcefully conscripted residents to dig security parameters in strategic places in Chibok.
“We were very hospitable to the soldiers when they first came. But our relationship with them became strained when they started beating our people, including elders. I personally used to carry firewood from farm to the soldiers but I decided to stop doing it because they started behaving as if it was their right. They will not even thank you for the effort,” a school-teacher in Chibok told me.
“Whatever they are telling you about the wrong attitude of the residents is their own fault. Our people decided to ignore them because they were becoming too brutal. Some of the soldiers are very wicked and they seem to delight in punishing even innocent people,” she said.
Securing Chibok
After four days in Chibok, I realised how right the soldiers were about the security alert and their plight as they laboured to keep the place safe. Politically, Chibok has local wards that include Shikarkir Garu, Kautikari, Gatamwarwa, Kuburmbula, Whuntaku, Mboa Kura, Kwarangilum, Yobe, Likama, Mbalala and Pemi, with Chibok town as the local government headquarters.
But most of the residents of other sub-communities have moved to Chibok town because the insurgents are still finding ways to attack them. These attacks are often not reported in the mass media. Throughout my stay in Chibok, reported cases of successful attacks and foiled attacks by security forces were rehearsed in my hearing.
Soldier guards at farms, worship centres
Most Chibok residents, unaware of what the soldiers go through day and night to ensure they are adequately protected in their own land, are going about their businesses and farming activities without any sense of a looming danger, unlike the soldiers with so much information.
At the moment, the farmers are harvesting groundnuts, vegetables, grains, onions, among others. At the same time, they are also busy planting crops like beans and tilling new grounds for further planting even as the rain continues to pour down.
But even though the farmers are not privileged to have soldiers protect them while they do their farm work, which may make them vulnerable in case of sudden attacks by insurgents, several soldiers have been thoughtfully stationed in near and far bushes where they are taking cover to deal with any security eventuality. The soldiers said they are sent in batches into the forest where they spend a month and then return to town for some sort of refreshment awaiting their turn to return to the forest.
The same practice holds true for worshippers. Every Friday in Chibok, armed soldiers are sent to provide security cover for Muslims while they worship. Throughout my stay in Chibok during the Ramadan fast, I observed that soldiers were always around whenever Muslims offered prayers in the only mosque I saw after breaking their fast.
On Sunday, armed soldiers were also seen guarding the entrance of church buildings as Christian trooped into churches to hold communion with their Creator. Some Christian soldiers on guard usually joined the worshippers but do so sitting at the entrance where entries can be monitored.
Government Secondary School, Chibok
Many Nigerians were taken by surprise when Aisha Alhassan, Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, said that the Federal Government would ensure that the 82 recently-rescued Chibok girls learnt how to speak English Language so they could sit for Senior Secondary Certificate Examinations.
Partly to understand why SS3 students could not speak English, but primarily to motivate the students not to give up the pursuit of a better life despite the challenge presented by Boko Haram, I took up a volunteer teaching job in Government Secondary School, Chibok, the same school where 276 girls were abducted in 2014.
On my first day in the school, I was shocked that only two out of 48 students in an SS1 class could communicate with me appreciably in English Language. It was the same situation in all the classes I visited, from JSS3 to SS2.
Owing to obvious breach in communication arising from language barrier, I decided to go back to the alphabet and from there we progressed to consonants and vowels. It was clear the students were having great fun as they moved from one class to another as I moved. They confessed to me that no one has ever taught them as I did. Some of them could pronounce a word after my first teaching and they grew better before I left. It was so painful to hear that some of the teachers in the school earned as low as N7,000 monthly, even though the national minimum wage has been at N18,000 for many years now.
Only a small portion of the school is currently in use as reconstruction work is ongoing on the main premises where the insurgents abducted the girls and destroyed buildings. The place is heavily guarded. Only the workers are allowed in. Because the current section in use is not enough, it is rationed among the students. Primary school pupils and SS1-SS2 students use the facility from 8:00am to 12:00pm, while JSS1-JSS3 students take over from noon till closing time.
My brush with soldiers in Chibok
Having listened to both the soldiers and residents of Chibok on the matter of strained relationship between both parties, I didn’t know where to accurately lay the blame. Both sides had presented their case very well. I had tongue-lashed the residents during one of the church services I attended over the way they treated soldiers sent to protect them and offered them counsel on how such attitude could be changed for the good of the community.
While a larger percentage promised to thenceforth be the good to their guests, a few others called me aside and rebuked me, telling me that my “sermon” was because I had yet to experience brutality of the soldiers. I was even told about a particular Internally Displaced Persons’ (IDPs) camp where the second in command has no respect for human rights.
That was how I decided to visit the IDPs camp with an interpreter to either prove the residents wrong or confirm the allegations by my own experience. It was two days to the day I was originally scheduled to leave Chibok for Maiduguri. We rode to the IDPs camp on bicycles. It was about seven minutes’ ride.
At the camp, I asked for the officer in charge and was taken to the same officer the residents had complained to me about. I told him I work for a Lagos-based NGO with primary interest in assisting orphans. I was in Chibok to visit friends and so my visit was not official, I told him.
“What is your mission in this camp now?” he asked.
“I just want to meet with some orphans whose parents were killed by Boko Haram,” I responded.
“Do you want to gather all of them together and speak to them at once?” he asked again.
Gathering everybody in that camp together was not my plan. So, my answer was no. I wanted to just speak to two or three families. He gave me permission and left me in the hands of a man I thought was a junior soldier because he was in uniform.
But while the uniformed man called out the orphans to meet with me, other persons in the camp, both old and young, male and female, started coming out but were asked to return with the explanation that I only wanted to talk to some orphans. I was left with some of the children.
When I finished interviewing 12 orphans from three families about their name, age, time of parents’ death and aspiration, I brought out my phone and started taking pictures with the children. I was about giving money to the orphans when the superior officer came back and accused me of gathering the IDPs, interviewing and taking pictures with them contrary to our agreement. He collected my phone and angrily.
It was thundering, with extremely harsh wind hurling sand at us. It was becoming impossible to keep the eyes wide open without attracting particles. Amid the sharp desert wind, the soldier commanded my interpreter and I to his shelter, about two minutes’ walk from where we were. It was already 5:30pm.
The allegations, of course, were false. I recalled all that the Chibok residents had said about the soldiers. They were right after all, I thought. I have been framed by this particular soldier, and the uniformed man he had left to supervise us could not say a word as the soldier shouted me down each time I opened my mouth to say something. I later learned that the man in uniform was an ordinary security man who was helping to coordinate the camp.
Within a few seconds the cloud grew even angrier, followed immediately by a rainstorm. The soldier quickly ran into his little shelter and left us in the torrent. Our plea for mercy fell on deaf ears. He and another colleague inside the shelter warned us not to come any closer. One and a half hours later, we were still in the rain, completely drenched and shivering to death, our teeth grinding together.
When the rain eventually subsided, the soldier asked me to go back home and bring my identity card while my interpreter, an indigene of Chibok, was held as a surety to guarantee my return. It was already dark and the whole place was flooded. I took the bicycle and headed home to bring my IDs, but I could only roll it amid heavy flood.
On my way back to the camp after picking up my IDs, I went a wrong way without realising it, until someone directed me back. Surprisingly, I met my interpreter and two soldiers coming to get me. The soldier who arrested us had sent them to come and search for me, assuming that I had fled from justice.
After seeing my IDs, he accused me of spying for Boko Haram and would not allow me to defend myself. Few minutes later, another soldier, who was his senior, came and joined him in the interrogation. He asked me to explain to them why they should believe I am not a member of Boko Haram. Convinced with my explanation, he then accused me of being a human trafficker who was obtaining children’s data for dangerous purpose. I denied all that and explained to him why that can never be option to me. He was calmer and appeared ready to let us to go, but our arrester wouldn’t just give in.
After the senior officer left, the soldier who arrested us called a superior officer at the army headquarters in Chibok who in turn sent two soldiers with Hilux van to bring us over. The soldiers came and loaded us and our bicycles inside the pickup and whisked us away into the silence night. My phone was also handed over to them. It was about 9:00pm.
We were taken to a guardroom where they kept five Boko Haram suspects and our legs were fastened to fetters.
At about noon the following day, we were released by the highest-ranking soldier in Chibok after serious background checks on me. When they discovered that I am journalist, they took time to listen to all the recordings on my phone and deleted them. I must say the senior soldiers were very responsible and mature about how they handled my case. I was warned not to talk or write about my experience in Chibok, but I assume they also knew that asking a journalist not to share his experience is a big joke. Some of them later told me as we were leaving that it was wickedness that brought us to the army highest office in Chibok. We should never have been there.
NATHANIEL AKHIGBE
(Edited by CHUKS OLUIGBO)
