'Boko Haram paid me N200 to detonate bomb' - Suspect

A female suicide bomber arrested by operatives of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), on Tuesday, February 7, 2017, in Maiduguri, Borno State, has confessed that she and her late colleague were paid N200 each for the mission.

The 18-year-old suspect identified only as Amina, according to News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), was intercepted alive while her colleague, Zainab, was shot dead when they tried to ram into motorists at the NNPC Mega Station along Damboa Road, Maiduguri.

Amina was said to have become scared and threw away the explosive wrapped around her and ran away but the operatives chased her to a safe place and shot her in the leg before she was arrested.

On interrogation, the would-be bomber said that she was abducted two years ago by the insurgent sect in Madagali, Adamawa State, and taken to the Sambisa forest where she was married off to one of the commanders.

Continuing, she said:

“They gave us N200 each which they said we should use to buy food for ourselves. It took us three days to come to Maiduguri on a motorcycle.We were directed by the sect members to detonate our explosives anywhere we saw any form of gathering.They said if we press the button, the bomb would explode and we will automatically go to heaven.I was scared, so, I told them that I could not detonate any explosive. So, they said if Zainab detonated her own, it would serve the purpose.On our way to Maiduguri, we encountered the military and they were shooting. I was very scared and the people that brought us ran away.I am from Imam Shekau’s faction of Boko Haram, even though I have never seen Shekau. But I hear about him in Gobarawa.”Amina added that her father, mother and younger brother, Umar, were all killed when they tried to escape from the Boko Haram enclave where they were held hostage.“We came from Gobarawa along Damboa, Madagali and Algarno axis, in a community where a lot of us were held hostage and married off by the sect members.I am also married to a Boko Haram Commander known as Amir.”

The Commandant of the NSCDC in charge of Borno State, Abdullahi Ibrahim, said the command had handed over the suspect to the Garrison Commander, 7 Division of the Nigerian Army, Maiduguri, for proper investigation.

On his part, the Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, Maj. Gen. Lucky Irabor, confirmed that the suspect was in custody of the Army and that she would undergo investigation.

“We are going to profile her as she would give us the lead to get to other insurgents.”

This is just one of the brain washing the Boko Haram sect plant in the minds of their suicide bombers with the erroneous belief that they would go straight to heaven once they kill in the name of Allah.