To estimate the intensity of parental love, one may have to adopt, for honest analyses, words of a mother who, on hearing the news of the abductions of girls in Chibok town, would say, "I would rather I were killed and my properties burnt than my daughter taken away" or the words of a similarly pained father: "I would rather I had the corpse of my daughter in my hands than live with the miseries of her sufferings in camps of some dangerous strangers."
No sane person would find the story of the abduction of these girls unworthy of empathy, let alone have it trivialised or politicised out of obvious mischief. These girls are representatives of all of us, because we are all insecure, so long as the insurgency continues. Whenever I picture the hell these girls are going through, I feel a sense of bereavement, even though they're still alive, as we have been shown in the latest video released by the terrorist group leader.
What have these little girls done to deserve this cruelty? They are innocent of the religious politics for which they're being held captive now. This abduction has not only denied them of an opportunity they had anxiously anticipated, an examination that may qualify them for admission into tertiary institution and be regarded as assets for the nation on the future, but has definitely affected their psychological well-being.
I'm devastated for I have looked beyond the present and unnecessary politics to realise that the place I call home as, like the Chibok girls, an Indigene of Borno State, is no longer the "Home of Peace" we had proudly sung about. I'm devastated as an indigene who has witnessed the educational backwardness of the north-eastern region and what this insurgency portends. I'm devastated because of this atmosphere of fear that is already uprooting the foundations we have been struggling to dig in order to cement our place and essence in the Nigerian house.
One question that bugs my mind remains, how do we get here? The people of Borno may have accepted the light of Islam hundreds of years before the coming of the Fulani jihadists, their appreciation of diversity was markedly celebrated, earning their polity the acronym "Home of Peace." Whose version of Islam has done to this to my home? Islam, as we know it, does not prohibit women seeking education or working in places that do not debase their womanhood. If anything, Islam challenges women to go extra length in acquiring education, just as a female gynecologist is expected to attend to female patients in organised Muslim societies. If the insurgents who also advocate for female specialists in the medical profession are honest to themselves, and truly Muslim in their religious dispositions, how do they expect such education and certificates earned without attending schools. Even the most pious of clerics would not expect such miracles!
So, we must be emphatic in highlighting that learning is not just a right but a responsibility for Muslims, which has been justified by Prophet Muhammad's saying that, "Seeking knowledge is mandatory on a Muslim male and female" (Ibn Majah) - a saying also confirmed in the Qur'an, thus: "Allah endows a higher status on those who are knowledgeable". The only knowledge whose acquisition is prohibited in Islam is that irrelevant for development of mankind, which include sorcery and magic.
If Allah, through His messenger, has made learning a necessity for us, whose religion are the insurgents promoting in their continuous quest for bloodlust? We must defy these setbacks, and devise the means to educate our girls, as decreed by Allah and as required by our social construct. As the brave Pakistani girl, Malala Yousafzai said in defying her hunters whose bullets failed to kill her, "The extremists were and they are afraid of books and pens, the power of education frightens them. They are afraid of women." This wisdom of a girl who's of the age-grade of Chibok girls must be embraced in confronting our threatening reality. Now is unsafe for politicising the safety and personality of Nigerians captured and free, home and abroad.
These girls, and Nigeria at large, need our undivided attention and collective support. Politicising their abduction is an unfortunate disservice. Everyone of us is a native of Chibok, a threatened Nigerian. I have been joining the mass sit-in organised by Abuja's #BringBackOurGirls campaigners where there's neither religious nor ethnic undertone in mounting pressure on our government and collaborating foreigners through media campaigns and one-on-one engagements with security chiefs and relevant politicians on efforts to rescue our girls. And the diversity I've observed there gives me hope and strength that the people of Borno are not alone in this. This needed unity is the only way to defeat our common enemies!
I'm a Nigerian from Nigeria. That I was born in Borno is not my decision. If I were born in Anambra or Bayelsa, Osun my indigeneship would've been of either of the two southern states. There's a need for every Nigerian to reflect on this unfairly criticised union: we're not responsible for the atrocities of our politicians. If the educated and supposedly enlightened citizens are vulnerable to obvious propagandas of relevance-seeking and bitter politicians who polarise us along the lines of religious and ethnic differences, what would be said of the forgotten farmers and fishermen who have never benefitted from the largesse of a government except on election years? In any time of national tragedy, let's remain united in our grief. Chibok is now a symbolism of Nigeria, being a morally destroyed habitat of unhappy people. So, as I stand in solidarity with the people of Chibok, let it be known that I'm also unhappy. Let it be known that I want to see my sisters back, and in school, protected. Let it be known that I am, like them, ambitious. Let it be known that I, too, am a Chibok girl.
On Twitter: @Yadomah
