Lois Azurfa, one of the 23 last batch hostages released by their abductors to the Chief of Defence Staff ministerial action committee last week, said she rejected the marriage offer of the terrorists’ commander despite the threats and dangers attached to the offer.
Interacting with her in an undisclosed private health center in Abuja, she explained how she was able to overcome the challenges of spending 190 days in the forest where they only ate what they found, drank whatever water was available, and slept in the open at the mercy of the weather in the midst of gun-wielding terrorists, without recourse to their families and without any idea of when they would regain their freedom, or if they would leave the forest alive.
Recounting their ordeal in the hands of their abductors after spending 190 days in the forest, Lois said on her hospital bed where she was undergoing post-trauma treatment, on Monday that she rejected the terrorists’ commander’s marriage offer, “yes, it is true that one of the terrorists’ Commanders picked and proposed to marry me, but it just an offer and I rejected it. Once you reject, they don’t force people.
“I was not the only one the terrorists offered to marry. They would just ask you, I want to marry you, I want to keep you and I want you to change your religion and convert to my religion. So, it is left for you to either agree or reject.”
Explaining how they were kidnapped in the March 28 attack on the last train of that fateful day, Lois said, “from the scene of the attack, I saw that the train just derailed, the terrorists entered the train, they started shooting sporadically and they asked us to go out. Then, the men were tied up, they collected our phones. We walked a distance that night before the bikes came. Then, they took us to where we spent that night. We journeyed for four days before we got to where they dropped us off, which is their main camp. We were there doing nothing, every day was just like a repetition of the previous day.
“We cooked in the morning and in the evening every day, so we eat twice a day. Anytime we are sick, they bring drugs that is just it. The terrorists have medical doctors who come around to give medical care.
“I never knew I was going to come out alive. Even if I was going to come out, I knew it was going to take a while. So, I was just there praying to God, waiting for the day I would leave the camp.
“The news of our leaving the camp just came unexpected. The terrorists just came and asked us to start packing our things. The preparation took a week until the final day when they now asked us to move and handed us over to the Presidential Committee.
“Now that I am out, I have forgiven my abductors, as much as God forgives our sins too. All that happened are in my past now, the terrorists are in my past too, it is over now, I don’t have anything against them.”