One year since the launch of its high-profile #EmpowerOurGirls campaign, Amnesty International has sounded the alarm over the Nigerian government’s continued abandonment of young girls and women who escaped Boko Haram captivity in the country’s troubled north-east. Despite harrowing experiences of forced marriage, abuse, and trafficking, many survivors are still left without critical reintegration support.
In a press statement released Tuesday, Amnesty International accused the Nigerian authorities of failing to provide the necessary care and rehabilitation support to survivors—many of whom were kidnapped as children by the extremist group Boko Haram.
“It is unacceptable that the Nigerian authorities still cannot ensure these girls and young women are able to rebuild their lives in safety,” said Isa Sanusi, Director of Amnesty International Nigeria.
Amnesty’s damning June 2024 report titled “Help Us Build Our Lives” laid bare the struggles faced by escapees. A year later, the reality has hardly changed. Follow-up interviews conducted in February 2025 exposed a grim pattern: survivors still have no reliable access to medical treatment, education, psychosocial counseling, or vocational training.
Eight girls and young women shared their stories with Amnesty—seven of them aged between 12 and 17, and one 22-year-old woman abducted during childhood. Their testimonies paint a bleak picture of systemic neglect. Many were detained in military custody immediately after their escape and never handed over to civilian agencies, directly violating Nigeria’s 2022 child protection agreement with the United Nations.
One survivor, now 17, described losing two children to starvation during her time in captivity.
“I didn’t receive anything from the government,” she said. “I don’t know of any support programs.”
Another girl, just 13, spoke of repeated attempts to flee Boko Haram, only to be caught and brutalized.
“They flogged us… If you do something wrong, they just flog us,” she recounted. After her escape, she pleaded: “We need support for shelter and food.”
In another heart-wrenching case, a 13-year-old was forcibly married after her father was murdered by Boko Haram. Upon her escape, she was briefly detained, then returned to her mother. Today, the family survives by selling firewood—unsupported and invisible to both state and aid organizations.
Amnesty says this continued failure by the government breaches not only Nigeria’s domestic child rights laws but also international obligations, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, and the Maputo Protocol.
Only one girl out of the eight interviewed said she received any meaningful help. Now 16, she recounted how military personnel helped trace her parents to a nearby IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) camp and reunited them.
“They went to the camps and searched for community leaders… and from there they located [my parents],” she told Amnesty.
Amnesty International has urged President Bola Tinubu’s administration to take immediate, concrete action. The organization is calling for urgent government measures to deliver medical care, food, housing, education, and economic support to these girls—before more fall through the cracks.
“These girls are not invisible. The government must stop acting as though they are,” Sanusi warned. “Our democracy and our humanity demand better.”
As the Boko Haram insurgency rages into its second decade, millions remain displaced across the north-east. In December 2024, Amnesty escalated the matter to the International Criminal Court, seeking an investigation into possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Nigeria.
With renewed attacks and fresh kidnappings continuing into 2025, the organization warns that unless urgent action is taken, more girls may be condemned to the same cycle of violence and abandonment.
This is not just a call for justice—it’s a cry for help. Nigeria cannot claim progress while it turns its back on the very girls who survived the worst.
