Do we still remember Leah Sharibu, the young Christian girl who was abducted by terrorists in 2018?
Today, May 14, 2025, Leah Sharibu clocks 22 years old and will once again, celebrate her birthday in captivity, for the seventh year running.
Leah was just 14, three months shy of her 15th birthday, when terrorists of the deadly Boko Haram sect, stormed her school, Government Girls’ Science and Technical College in Dapchi, Yobe State.
It was on a Monday evening, February 19, 2018, and they raided the dormitories, herding terrified students into waiting trucks. 110 of the young schoolgirls, including Leah, were abducted. Five died along the way; by March 21, 2018, 104 had been released. But Leah wasn’t released because she refused to deny her Christian faith and her love for Jesus Christ.
Since then, all efforts to rescue her have been futile while there have been unconfirmed rumours that she has been married off to about three commandants of the sect and have children for them.
Today is the seventh birthday she will be spending in captivity and her mother, Rebecca Sharibu, has once again appealed to Nigerians to pray for her wherever she is.
The last time her mother saw her, Leah was only 14 and one can only imagine the agony she will be going through.
While speaking on her daughter, Rebecca said:
“Leah loves the Word of God. She tried hard not to do anything that would get me angry. She was a member of a few church groups, and she followed all the programmes in the church.”
Rebecca remembers Leah’s 14th birthday in 2017.
“I sang for her, ‘Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you.’ I sang for her, and she was happy and she laughed. She was happy. That was the last birthday we celebrated for her at home.”
“Often when I think about Leah, when I am sitting or eating or doing something else, and start to think about her, there is this verse that I read, and it encourages me.
“It is from Psalm 123. It reads: ‘I lift up my eyes to you, to you who sit enthroned in heaven. As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a female slave look to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till he shows us his mercy. Have mercy on us, Lord, have mercy on us, for we have endured no end of contempt.’
“I am pleading with you, brothers and sisters in Christ. We know that Leah will have her birthday. I am pleading with you the world over to continue praying for Leah and all those in captivity to be released.
“Just like Alice (another woman who was taken by Boko Haram) who has been freed after seven years, and she told me that Leah is doing well, and I should not worry because one day she will come back.
“So, I am pleading with you, just like we have been praying for her night and day, I am pleading with you to join our hands and keep on praying concerning Leah and others in captivity, that God will bring them out safely.”
