Boko Haram Video Claims Captive Christian Teen Thought Dead Is Still Alive

An independent journalist revealed a
video released by Boko Haram this
weekend in which one of its many
captives claims that Leah Sharibu, a
Nigerian Christian teen abducted in
early 2018 is alive, contradicting
earlier reports.
Sharibu is the last of 110 girls the group
abducted from the town of Dapchi, northeastern
Yobe state, in early 2018 to remain in captivity.
Boko Haram jihadists have refused to release her
because she has not accepted forced conversion
to Islam and “marriage” to one of the terrorists.
Boko Haram is a Nigeria-based jihadist group
affiliated with the Islamic State. Its leaders have
taken an oath of allegiance to the Islamic State
and officially renamed the group Islamic State
West Africa Province (ISWAP). Nigerian officials
have repeatedly claimed that a splinter group of
jihadists who rejected the Islamic State’s
authority currently operate separately and often
use this to claim that Boko Haram no longer
exists.
Journalist Ahmad Salkida published a snippet of
a video featuring captives he identified as being
under ISWAP control on Twitter Saturday and
explained on his website that the terrorist group
released the video less than a day after the
publication Friday of a gruesome film showing
the execution of four humanitarian aid workers
the group abducted in July. The exact date of
their murders remains unknown.
A man Salkida identifies as “Bitrus Zakka Bwala,
a principal lecturer with the College of
Education, Gashua in Yobe state,” speaks before
the camera, sitting alongside several men and
one woman. Salkida counts 13 captives and notes
that the terrorists graphically covered the
woman’s face, who appears to be wearing a
hijab. The captives do not make any indication
that the woman is Sharibu, though Sharibu is the
only woman mentioned by name. Instead, Boko
Haram terrorists allege the woman was abducted
near Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state, where
Boko Haram was born.
“I appeal to the Federal Government, as you can
see here (there are various Christians among
those) abducted at various points,” the man
identified as Zakka says. “When we came, we
saw some workers here, particularly the ones
with the Action Against Hunger, before they
were executed. We saw that government has not
done enough and that is why Leah Sharibu is
still here.”
“We, therefore, appeal in particular to President
Muhammadu Buhari to do whatever is within his
reach to rescue us. We equally appeal to our
various governors to come to our aid and rescue
us,” the man says. “The leadership of Christian
organizations, we appeal to you to liaise with the
Federal government and push for the rescue of
all captives here.”
Action Against Hunger is a humanitarian aid
organization operating in the region. The group
lost four of its members to Boko Haram
execution in the video published before the most
recent tape. Nigerian President Buhari confirmed
that the executions had occurred and that they
were a product of what Nigerian media described
as “a breakdown of negotiations with the
government.”
“Evil will always be defeated by good at the end
of the day. Whatever seeming victory evil
records, eventually rebounds on the evildoer,”
Buhari said last week in response to the killings.
“We are resolved to beat evil in this land, and we
remain unrelenting till we achieve it.”
Salkida did not publish the entirety of the
extended video in which Zakka claims Sharibu is
alive, but he states that the captive men identify
themselves in front of the camera and the group
appears to be a mix of Muslims and Christians,
though mostly Christian.
Boko Haram roughly translates from the native
Hausa language to “Western education is sin.”
The group for years focused on killing, raping,
and abducting girls and women from schools to
prevent the nation’s women from having an
education. They rose to international prominence
in 2014 after abducting over 300 girls from
Chibok, Borno state, a village near Maiduguri.
Some of the Chibok girls remain unaccounted for
five years later.
The Dapchi mass abduction that took Leah
Sharibu in February 2018 was similar to that of
Chibok , albeit smaller in number. The terrorists
who captured her negotiated for the release of
the other 109 girls, but refused to hand over
Sharibu, claiming that they could not because
she had not yet renounced Christianity.
Sharibu appeared in a hostage audio clip in
August 2018, which her father confirmed
sounded like her voice.
“I am Leah Sharibu, the girl that was abducted in
GGSS Dapchi. I am calling on the government
and people of goodwill to intervene to get me out
of my current situation,” the voice said . “I also
plead to the members of the public to help my
mother, my father, my younger brother and
relatives. Kindly help me out of my predicament.
I am begging you to treat me with compassion, I
am calling on the government, particularly, the
President to pity me and get me out of this
serious situation.”
Little information surfaced on Sharibu until
nearly a year later, when an Action Against
Hunger aid worker claimed the terrorists had
killed her in July.
“Do something to see that we are released,” the
aid worker, Grace Taku, said in a Boko Haram
video. “I am begging on behalf of all of us here
that please Nigeria should not allow such [death]
to happen to us. And it also happen again with
Leah [Sharibu] and Alice – because Nigeria could
not do anything about them they were not
released; they were also killed.”