I escaped Beast of Boko Haram: Schoolgirl's blood tingling story of flight from the childcatcher - aided, incredibly, by one of his OWN thugs

  • Amina Tsawur managed to convince one terrorist to release her as they spoke the same local dialect
  • Terror chief Abubakar Shekau has threatened to 'sell' the schoolgirls
  • Mail on Sunday poll shows public supports SAS backed rescue mission

By Barbara Jones In Abuja, Nigeria and Mark Nichol

Published: 17:45 EST, 10 May 2014 | Updated: 18:32 EST, 10 May 2014

A Nigerian teenager held captive by ruthless Islamist group Boko Haram has told for the first time how a sympathetic member of the terrorist group who spoke her local language helped her escape.

Amina Tsawur, 17, who was kidnapped alongside hundreds of classmates, has revealed how she managed to trick her captors and escape through snake-infested undergrowth in northern Nigeria.

She said a member Boko Haram, led by Abubakar Shekau, dubbed the Beast of Boko Haram, told her to ask to be moved away from the other hostages so she could relieve herself.

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Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has claimed responsibility for kidnapping the 300 girls and is threatening to sell them

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has claimed responsibility for kidnapping the 300 girls and is threatening to sell them

She followed his instructions, then ran through the jungle and reached a highway where a passing motorist drove her to a nearby town.

She revealed that during her ordeal her kidnappers taunted and insulted their captives, and  threatened to kill them and their teachers.

Today, The Mail on Sunday can also report how:

  • A parent has claimed that teachers from the school in Chibok received a tip-off that the raid was to take place, allowing them to take their daughters home and avoid the kidnappers.
  • A team of SAS soldiers were in Nigeria when the schoolgirls were snatched. Yet the Nigerian President turned down an offer for the crack troops to join the rescue mission.
  • US First Lady Michelle Obama made an emotional broadcast from the White House yesterday describing how she and Barack Obama see the faces of their daughters in pictures of the captured girls.
  • A poll commissioned by this newspaper estimated 56 per cent of Britons support UK Special Forces being sent to rescue the girls.

Amina Tsawur remains traumatised by the thought of her friends being raped, abused and enslaved by Boko Haram gunmen.

 

More...

International model Cara Delevingne joined the social media campaign calling for the release of the kidnapped school girls

International model Cara Delevingne joined the social media campaign calling for the release of the kidnapped school girls

Puff Daddy has also given his support to the campaign to free the kidnapped girls

Puff Daddy has also given his support to the campaign to free the kidnapped girls

Describing the moment of her capture, she said: ‘It was about llpm and we were very scared to hear shooting. We didn’t know what to do or where to run.

‘After some time we started seeing men in soldiers’ uniforms coming in the school by torchlight.

'We thought they were soldiers. They said they had been sent to evacuate us so we would not be harmed.

‘We followed them outside and they got us into a lorry. When they shouted ‘Allahu Akhbar’ [God is great], we knew they were Boko Haram.

‘We all started crying and begging for help, but they ordered us to keep shut or they would kill us.

‘They took us into the bush and we drove all night and in the morning too, until we arrived at a place where they asked some of us to cook, others to wash dishes, some to grind corn and other chores.

‘They kept insulting us and saying that we must stop going to school, that they were going to marry all of us to their people; that our teachers and government are unbelievers whom they would all kill.’

After her escape, Amina eventually reached Damboa, a market town on the edge of the jungle, 50 miles from Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State. In total, 50 girls are believed to have fled after the kidnapping on April 14.

Schoolgirls Aminar Tsawur, right, and Martha, left, being reunited with their family after being kidnapped by the Boko Haram terrorists from their school in Chibok, Nigeria

Schoolgirls Aminar Tsawur, right, and Martha, left, being reunited with their family after being kidnapped by the Boko Haram terrorists from their school in Chibok, Nigeria

Last night, counter-terrorism expert Robin Horsfall, a veteran of the SAS’s storming of the Iranian Embassy in 1980, said Amina would be a crucial intelligence asset in the hunt for Boko Haram’s leaders.

‘She’s got faces, languages, tribes, directions of movement, vehicles, a huge amount of vital information to pass on to the Nigerian military,’ he said. ‘Its officers are very capable, well educated and professional.

‘British Special Forces might play a role as technical advisers, in a bid to reduce casualties. But this is delicate ground.’

Defence sources have told this newspaper how, soon after the kidnapping, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan was assured by his military advisers that they could handle every aspect of the crisis. This was apparently why he turned down a British offer of SAS help.

He later changed his mind and at least 12 additional  SAS soldiers have since deployed to Nigeria from their base in Hereford.

A majority of people surveyed by the Mail on Sunday said the SAS, pictured, should be deployed to Nigeria

A majority of people surveyed by the Mail on Sunday said the SAS, pictured, should be deployed to Nigeria

Mr Horsfall added: ‘In the President’s defence, the Nigerian army and air force are accustomed to dealing with kidnap situations because these incidents happen a lot there.

‘But by now the girls are likely to have been split up as assets to be bought and sold.’

Last night, Enoch Mark, whose daughter and two nieces were taken by the gunmen, claimed that teachers at the school received a tip-off that the Boko Haram raid was going to take place.

 

Mr Mark, a pastor, said: ‘Some students whose parents were staff at the school, nothing happened to them because I was told that they were informed. So they checked out their daughters and sent them home.’

But last night sources in Chibok claimed some girls were not at school because they had been sent home to revise for their exams.

Yesterday, First Lady Michelle Obama said she and her husband Barack were ‘outraged and heartbroken’ over the abduction.

Making her husband’s weekly presidential address, she said: ‘In these girls Barack and I see our own daughters; we see their hopes and their dreams, and we can only imagine the anguish their parents are feeling.’

She was speaking after a Survation poll for The Mail on Sunday revealed that 56 per cent of 1,000 UK respondents believe Britain should offer SAS help with the rescue operation.

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The world is going forever backwards it seems. Those poor girls.

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What's with all these people with the signs bring back 'our' girls?? They don't belong to you!

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'Im not entirely sure what a load of celebs will do holding up signs.

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I hate to say it, but the girls are gone. I don't think any of them will be back. They could be all over the world by now. People think every single one if locked up in some house, they're not.

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Although this is a sickening , cowardly act, what is more cringeworthy are the "celebs" who are holding the placards with "bring back OUR girls" on them. They will stop at nothing to get their faces in the media.

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Make that one more Brit who supports the SAS going in and taking out these scum.

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Ooh, look at me, I am a celebrity who thinks that holding up a message via twitter is going to make the blindest bit of difference. Anything for a bit of free coverage. Unleash the SAS and watch how it is really done!

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Boko Haram MUST be wiped out - every single last one of them.

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I hope the SAS boys are given the choice to go. Surely the Nigerian army should have enough resource to mount a rescue mission?

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All for a magic man in the sky.

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