A suspected suicide bomber arrested in northern Cameroon last week before she could blow herself up is not one of 219 schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram in the Nigerian town of Chibok in 2014, a public advocacy group said on Wednesday.
The Murtala Muhammed Foundation (MMF), a non-government organisation, partnered with the Federal Government to help parents from Chibok verify the girl’s identity after she claimed to be among the missing students.
Nigeria’s government had said it was keen to ascertain the girl’s identity so that she could possibly assist the government in investigations regarding the fate and whereabouts of the missing Chibok girls.
MMF chief Aisha Muhammed-Oyebode said three representatives of parents of the missing students looked at photographs of the girl and a woman she was arrested with and said they “do not fit the description of any of the missing daughters from Chibok”.
She said the Nigerian government told her group on Tuesday that the girl identified herself as a 12-year-old originally from Maiduguri, northeast Nigeria, who was abducted from Bama about 60 km (40 miles) away, when the town was overrun by Boko Haram a year ago.
The woman was said to have identified herself as a 35-year-old mother of two. Muhammed-Oyebode said the pair had been handed to the Nigerian military and were returning to Nigeria.
Authorities in Cameroon and Nigeria over the weekend cast doubt on the young girl’s claim to be from Chibok because of inconsistencies in her age.
The youngest of the schoolgirls kidnapped in Chibok was 16 in 2014, according to the Bring Back Our Girls advocacy group.
Muhammed-Oyebode said they were “yet to ascertain how the girl came to describe herself as one of the missing Chibok girls”.
Cameroon’s presidency has said the child was found to be heavily drugged, which is consistent with Boko Haram’s deployment of children as suicide bombers.
“The identity of the girl notwithstanding, the MMF has informed the Nigerian government of its willingness to continue to pursue the matter, and is willing to provide the captured girl and woman any support they may require,” said Muhammed-Oyebode.
“These girls and women are merely victims, and must be treated as such by… society. They have already undergone grave violence at the hands of their Boko Haram captors.
“We must ensure that they are not made to undergo additional violence at the hands of their compatriots.”
Boko Haram has kidnapped thousands of young women and girls since the start of its Islamist insurgency in 2009, forcing them to become sex slaves or human bombs.
The ISIS affiliate seized 276 schoolgirls in Chibok on the night of April 14, 2014. Fifty-seven escaped in the immediate aftermath but 219 are still being held.
Joint operations between Nigeria and neighbouring countries drove Boko Haram from many of its strongholds last year but the group has stepped up cross-border attacks and suicide bombings, many of which have been carried out by young girls.
