"He soon began to threaten me with a knife to have sex with him and when I refused, he brought out his gun, warning that he would kill me if I shouted."
"Then he began to rape me every night … I had never had sex before; it was very painful and I cried bitterly because I was bleeding afterwards."
These were the words of a 15-year-old girl, who was abducted by Boko Haram and forcibly married to one of its commanders in a camp in the Sambisa Forest, Borno State.
The girl, according to a report by Human Rights Watch, was abducted in 2013 but she escaped after four weeks in captivity.
The teenager is one of the five girls that personally recounted their ordeals in the publication which was made public on Monday. She said that after her marriage to the commander who was in his early 30s, she was ordered to live with him in cave.
An 18-year-old victim also described how an insurgent sexually abused her when she went to use the bathroom.
She said, "I did not know he followed me when I walked a short distance away from the tree under which we slept. He grabbed me from behind, roughly fondling me while trying to take off his pants. I screamed in fright and he hurriedly left me as I continued to shout for help."
Another woman, who was raped in 2013 in one of the militants' camps near Gwoza, described how a commander's wife seemed to encourage the crime.
"I was lying down in the cave pretending to be ill because I did not want the marriage the commander planned to conduct for me with another insurgent on his return from the Sambisa camp. When the insurgent who had paid my dowry came in to force himself on me, the commander's wife blocked the cave entrance and watched as the man raped me."
Another woman aged 19, who was married and had children, described how she and one other woman were raped after having been abducted in April 2014.
She said, "When we arrived at the camp, they left us under a tree. I managed to sleep. I was exhausted and afraid. Late in the night, two insurgents woke me and another woman, saying their leader wanted to see us.
"We had no choice but to follow them; but as soon as we moved deep into the bush, one of them dragged me away, while his partner took the other woman to another direction.
"I guessed what they had in mind and I began to cry. I begged him, telling him I was a married woman. He ignored my pleas, flung me on the ground, and raped me. I could not tell anyone what happened, not even my husband.
"I still feel so ashamed and cheated. The other woman told me she was also raped but vowed never to speak of it as she was single and believes that news of her rape would foreclose her chances of marriage."
Source: Punch
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