One of the 276 schoolgirls abducted by terrorists in Northern Nigeria in 2014 has obtained an associate degree from a community college in the United States of America.
Her graduation day came five years, one month and three days after the ignoble mass abductions that sparked global outrage and ignited the #Bringbackourgirls campaign.
The 23-year-old Palmatah Mutah, who escaped by jumping out of a Boko Haram truck, becomes the first escaped Chibok girl in the world to obtain an associate degree from an institution abroad.
Many Nigerians were shocked that most of the 57 Chibok students who escaped could not speak English, although they were final-year students.
However Ms Mutah proved to be an exceptional candidate and after just one year in a two-year programme in the US meant to enable them complete their high school education, she took a Community College entrance examination and passed. She was the only one out of 10 Chibok girls sponsored to school in the US by international human rights lawyer, Emmanuel Ogebe, and others to make it to Community College within the first year of arrival.
Ogebe said, “Her graduation is a highpoint of five years of toil and travail. Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” “She is an illustration of millions of brilliant kids in Nigeria undiscovered for opportunity but for tragedy.
She has been a worthy ambassador of Nigeria and of Chibok and especially, of the still missing classmates….”
