Five Years After Kidnapping, Nigeria’s Chibok School Girls Fade From the International Scene | Council of Foreign Relations

In April 2014, Boko Haram kidnapped 276 female students gathered in Chibok to sit for high school examinations. The international community responded with outcry and condemnation. At the time of the abduction, female empowerment and education in the developing world was widely discussed in the United States. The story and efforts of a young charistmatic Pakistani activist, Malala Yousafzai, drove interest in the topic, and Chibok fed into those concerns. First Lady Michelle Obama joined many celebrities in an international “bring back our girls” campaign. In Nigeria, the Jonathan administration, at first, did not take action. The Nigerian first lady characterized the kidnapping as a hoax. But Nigerian civil society, led by former education minister Oby Ezekwesili, among others, successfully pressured the Jonathan administration to take action, though to little avail.