I helped 10 pregnant women deliver babies bare-handed in captivity — Rescued Kwara nurse

A rescued victim of the February 3 terrorist attack on Woro and Nuku communities in Kaiama Local Government Area of Kwara State, Amirah Salihu, has recounted the harsh conditions she and other captives endured during their nearly six months in captivity.

Salihu, who is a nurse and the daughter of Umar Salihu, the chief of Woro community, said she took delivery of 10 pregnant women with her bare hands while in captivity.

She disclosed this in an interview aired by Channels Television’s Politics Today on Friday.

According to her, the captives were poorly fed and often slept in the open, including near a river, despite heavy rainfall.

“The kind of food that they were giving us was bad. The day that we got there, they just dropped guinea corn for us with salt and Maggi. Every day after, they gave us one bag of corn without oil, pepper, nothing. There was a day that they didn’t even give us Maggi again, just salt,” she said.

Salihu said the captives were sometimes given kuka, a local food preparation, but that the abductors eventually stopped providing it.

“And they kept us inside river. The place that we sleep is inside river. And rain always used to fall, sometimes. If we set fire, they asked us to put off the fire,” she added.

She said she assisted pregnant women who went into labour during the period, after the abductors asked whether there was a nurse among the captives.

“Sometimes they give us fruits, sometimes they don’t give us. That’s how we used to sleep with our children. And I have seen people over there, pregnant woman, that they deliver.

“They asked of nurse, ‘Is there any nurse with us?’ I said no, because I was… I am also a nurse, I just used to help pregnant women do delivery. I helped like 10 women for the delivery, without gloves. I used my hands to help them,” she said.

Salihu said the terrorists later came to know of her nursing skills and wanted her to remain with them, but she declined.

“But at last, when they got to know, they wanted to keep me, that I should stay with them, but I said no. I want to come back,” she said.