Stories from the Camp: Haphsat Illiayasu

My name is Haphsat Illiayasu. I came from Gwoza.

Boko Haram came to our village at 4 (pm/am), we were confused,  all we could hear were bullets and bombs everywhere. They had been in the village for a time, the men thought they had left the village but they were still in the village. They entered alleyways and everywhere in the village. There was nowhere you couldn’t see them. Our men came out thinking that boko haram had left as the shooting had stopped all night until 7am in the morning. Our men came out and what the boko haram would do to them was catch them on the road, cut off their heads, and keep their heads on their backs. Others would be killed on the spot.

So our men started retreating back into the house and we started dressing them up as women. We would crowd together, the men pretending to be women and the women and we would take them to hide in the mountains.  So any time we saw men and boys we would dress them up as women  and take them to the mountains for safety. Even small boys, 5 year old, were not safe from boko Haram.

When they finished killing all our men, it was only the ones that escaped that were alive. There was no food, no water, only God had mercy on them. For example when it rained on them, the water that fell on the ground they would gather up and drink. That’s how they survived

Like my husband was eating leaves and “Samiya “leaves to survive. Even the chief of my village was among them on the mountain, he spent 8 days there and thank God there was heavy rain one night,  and they escaped, it was said that the rain stopped Boko Haram’s  guns from working. To escape they went through the bush not the road. They went to Madagali.

The (Boko haram) women that remained in Gwoza said we should leave the town, that if we don’t leave they would take us with them to where they were going. Then we said how could you take us, when you have killed all our men. They said they had brought us religion, but how can they bring us religion when we have our own. They said all of us were unbelievers and they had come to save us with their religion.

They came into our houses and broke everything looking for men. We decided to leave. If they found a woman refusing to leave they would beat her. They beat us and beat us.