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Stigma Slows Reintegration of Former Boko Haram Fighters

Chika Oduah

   MAIDUGURI, NIGERIA, - Fifty-six-year-old Ibrahim Dubji is still trying
   to adjust to life out of the bushes of rural northeastern Nigeria.

   It's been about three years since he left. He was a fighter with Boko
   Haram, taking cover in the region's rocky and semi- arid terrain.

   Around the Borno State town of Gwoza, which Boko Haram captured in 2014
   and declared as the headquarters of their Islamic caliphate, Dubji
   spent two years with the armed group, invading and attacking villages.

   He says he struggled with the group's extreme mode of operation.

   "The son of my elder brother, they killed him in my presence," Dubji
   says. "That is the worst thing I always remember."

   He found a way to escape the group, turning himself in at a Nigerian
   military base. He said the soldiers there accepted his surrender but
   flogged him for four days, with "sticks, cables and machetes."

   Last year, Dubji went through Operation Safe Corridor. It's the
   Nigerian government's official rehabilitation and de-radicalization
   program, set up in 2016, mainly for low-ranking Boko Haram fighters and
   low-risk women and children affiliated with the Islamist group.

   Dujbi says he's a reformed man. But he's treated like an outcast. When
   he went back to his hometown to see his mother after being away, he
   said he wasn't welcomed.

   "People suspect that you are still Boko Haram or a Boko Haram
   informant," he says. "The government has already cleared us'¦ but
   still, people around are suspecting us," says Dujbi. "I need
   forgiveness from people."

   He's now more than 150 km from his home, living in Maiduguri, the Borno
   State capital known as the birthplace of Boko Haram. Dujbi found safe
   haven at a refugee camp and the government gave him help to set up a
   small grocery store to support his wife and nine children.

   Hundreds of people linked to Boko Haram have gone through Operation
   Safe Corridor and the Nigerian military is releasing them to rejoin
   civilian life. But they face intense social stigma that doctors say
   contributes to mental health problems.

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