The boy sneaked out of the Boko Haram hideout that had been his home for three days at midnight. Then he walked through the forest for hours before he found help. Like the other boys recruited by the insurgents, he had been told that he would be hunted down and killed if he run away.
Babagana said: “I didn’t leave with anything. When the chance came to escape, I only had my pants on. I ran almost naked.”
He still brightly memories his instinctive induction into a world of misery. Boko Haram insurgents raided the rural town of Gamboru in Borno State, burnt down houses and required that the local children be handed over to them.
Parents who opposed were slaughtered, and a couple of children were forcefully taken.
“They asked me about my parents,” the boy said. “They then killed them in front of me.”
“That is how Boko Haram operates. They first take out your parents so you have no one else to fall back to.”
For several days, Babagana traveled with insurgents through the dusty trails of Borno, not knowing what his fate would be as the fighters duplicated the horrors they’d visited upon Gamboru. Babagana saw many of his fellow captives and people from other villages killed by Boko Haram.
“They killed people for no reason,” he said. “I just couldn’t stand the horror. It made me terribly scared.”
While he was only with the terrorists for three days, Babagana witnessed acts so cruel that he decided to risk his life to escape.
“They killed anyone who didn’t heed to their instructions,” he said. “Girls were often subjected to sexual abuse. Anyone who proved stubborn was shot dead.”
“I lost my mind with all that I saw,” the boy continued. “I thought if I didn’t find a way of escaping, sooner rather than later, it would be my turn.”
Babagana tried to meet a handful of fellow hostages to escape with him. He was ineffective, as they were too frightened to make any move.
“I tried to talk my colleagues into escaping. They wanted to, but were scared they could be caught and killed,” he evoked.
Around midnight on the next day, Babagana made his move, escaping into the bush as his abductors shouted in alarm and began to shoot at him. He succeeded to escape without a bullet wound. Alone in the wasteland, he continued to run, not knowing if he was being followed.
“I was lucky to have escaped,” Babagana said. “There were so many voices and bullets coming after me,” he added.
The boy finally made it back to Gamboru, but found himself disliked by his kinsmen, who no longer believed him. Unable to rely on the community for protection, Babagana again went on the move, traveling to from one village to the other across northern Borno and many times narrowly avoiding retake as insurgents kept raiding new communities. He finally made it to a displacement camp in Maiduguri, a place he now calls home.
Hassan Mustapha, a child-protection specialist in Borno state capital, said children are often put to a “test of manhood” once there are recruited.
“Once a child is conscripted by Boko Haram, he is first asked to kill his parents, which is a symbol of initiation into the sect,” he said. “They destroy everything of value to these children so they have no options.”
Many of the children seized by Boko Haram serve on the front lines, fighting for control of villages and prowling the homes of the citizens. Others children serve as spies, scouts, porters, cooks, and bodyguards for officers. Girls are also kept as sex slaves.
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