Meet Aisha, Juliana and Hauwa—three women whose names rarely make headlines despite enduring unimaginable suffering at the hands of Boko Haram. In a deeply researched feature, The Republic shines a light on these survivors, whose stories are often overshadowed by the group’s high-profile mass abductions.

For Aisha, the nightmare began on an April evening in 2014. While preparing her children’s favorite meal in Gamboru Ngala, Borno State, militants stormed the village. There was no time to escape. Her brother was killed before her eyes. Like many other women, she was kidnapped and taken to a makeshift camp. “A tall, bearded man entered, declaring himself the insurgent commander. He claimed I would become his wife,” Aisha recounts. “Every night, he came for me. The abuse was relentless.”

Breaking free from captivity

After two years of forced marriages, repeated rapes and three pregnancies, Aisha managed to escape during a Nigerian military offensive. Juliana’s ordeal lasted just as long. At 15, she was abducted alongside her mother in Adamawa State. “Before my capture, I dreamed of finishing high school and studying computer engineering,” she recalls. With the help of an elderly woman, she fled after two years in captivity.

Hauwa’s suffering spanned a decade. Married three times against her will, she endured four childbirths in captivity. Upon returning home, she felt “defiled” and “branded as a ‘Boko Haram wife,’” a label that stigmatized her and her children. “They’re treated like outcasts, denied the chance to play with other kids,” she shares.

The article also explores the stigma faced by survivors and highlights a critical initiative aimed at reintegrating these women into communities that often reject them. Additionally, it examines how transitional justice could address the impunity for gender-based violence and help victims heal. “People celebrate my freedom, but part of me remains trapped in that forest. I’m haunted by the women we left behind,” Juliana confesses.