A United States-based group, US-Nigeria Law Group, has bemoaned the plight of abandoned Dapchi brave Christian, Leah Sharibu, who is held captive by Boko Haram insurgents for three years and five weeks, reporting she has given birth to a second child in captivity.
Leah who was abducted in Dapchi, Yobe State alongside other schoolgirls, was coerced to accept Islam before being given in marriage to a Boko Haram Supremo after she declined to renounce her Christian faith.
She was abducted alongside other 109 girls aged between 11 and 19 years, from Government Girls Science and Technical Colege, Dapchi, on February 19, 2018.
According to the leader of the US-Nigeria Law Group, Emmanuel Ogebe, in a statement, despite an offer by an American pastor last month to surrender himself in exchange for Leah’s freedom, there has been no tangible response from her captors.
Ogbebe said, “That notwithstanding, intelligence received on the status of Leah indicates that she has delivered a second child in captivity.
“While we have not corroborated this by multiple sources, a usually knowledgeable source indicated that she delivered a second child late last year. This means both children were born in 2020, as the terrorists announced her childbirth earlier in 2020. We are still investigating this,”
The group in a commemorative statement to mark the March 21 third anniversary of the release of the Dapchi girls released by their captives and “abandonment of Leah Sharibu”, “until she is released, Leah remains a poster child and symbol of a failed state that can’t protect its children.
The group also bemoaned the “full-scale onslaught on education in Nigeria by Islamist extremists: Boko Haram wars against education; bandits mass kidnap of children in school; and religious violence against Christian mission school owners in Ilorin over hijab controversy.”