Chibok girls: Local Hunters Identify 9 Hostage Camps
Members of the volunteers local vigilante group in Borno State yesterday reportedly confirmed the identification of about nine Boko Haram camps around Sambisa, where the abducted girls are currently being held.
The group according to a report said their members, who are operating in the neighbourhood of Sambisa, had noticed strange movements in the area that led to the confirmation that the abducted schoolgirls had been split up into tiny groups and shared among different camps in the Sambisa forest.
“We are very sure of our discovery and we have informed the security operatives accordingly,” said the state leader of the vigilante group, Alhaji Adamsi Tar, who spoke to LEADERSHIP alongside the group’s spokesman, Muhammed Gava.
“As we are talking to you now, the girls are being held in forests near Ashigashiya, Dure Tsiradawale, Gwadale, Kirawa, Valangade, Yamatake, Shinagawa, Garinwabi and Sasawa,” he said.
“These are communities surrounding Sambisa forest in the southern part of Borno State. A large number of the girls is being held in the forests of Ashigashiya and Shuwaram, only a few of the girls are in Tsiradawale, Mitele and Alagarno, which is a border town near Boso in Niger Republic.”
The vigilante members, who are also seasoned hunters that know the terrain, said the Boko Haram members were tactically shifting their camps to the edges of Sambisa, because “the Sambisa forest itself becomes a swampy and marshy place during the rainy season and it is usually not very habitable; except during the dry season.”
The group said they get such privileged information, because they are spread across all the local government areas of the state.
“We have over 9000 members in the state and our members operate along the highways and the bushes of their localities. We could do better at complementing the conventional security operatives if we are better equipped,” said Gava.
