Indy Nigerians Call for Return Of Kidnapped Girls

Since April, nearly 300 girls between the ages of 12 and 16 have been held captive in Nigeria by the terrorists group Boko Haram.

The United States announced this week it is deploying 80 armed forces members to find them.

Thursday, a rally in Indianapolis called for swift action in bringing the schoolgirls home.

For the past five weeks, Walle Mafolasire has been asking himself the question, what if?

What if one of the nearly 300 girls who have been kidnapped in Nigeria was his sister, or one of his nieces or cousins?

"For me it really touches home and we are crying out here," he said.

Mafolasire is the president of the Indianapolis chapter of Nigerians in Diaspora Organization and helped lead a rally downtown to bring attention to the kidnapping, which he calls an act of cowardness.

"When cowardly people want to show how big of cowards they are, they prey on the weakest people in our society," said Mafolasire.  "And, this is what we see here with this group of bandits, cowards that have abandoned going after men who can defend themselves and go after little girls."

Standing on the steps around monument circle, Housseina Himou chants with a dozen others to bring the girls back home.

Himou is from Niger, which boarders Nigeria, and also has felt the impact the terrorist group Boko Haram. She says the case has gone on too long and is losing patience.

"Every time I see these girls on TV, I just start crying," said Himou.  "It's 2014, those girls cannot, in an African country, those girls cannot just get lost like that. They have to find them."

Himou has two girls of her own and wrote a book about young women being forced into marriage.

She hopes the rally in Indianapolis keeps attention on the kidnappings and increases the speed of the recovery efforts.

"They need to get the girls back to the parents.  It's just sad," she said.  "We just want everybody to come together and together we will win this fight and we will not stop until the girls are back home to their parents."

City County Councilor Vop Osili is calling for more action, too.  He says the United States needs to be more aggressive in going after the terrorists who are responsible.

"You don't kill weeds by knocking off the bloom.  You go straight to the roots," said Osili.  "These things are funded from capital somewhere.  So, America has great opportunity and great resources to determine where are those funds from coming from?  Because, this needs to be hit at the top and has to be hit at the bottom to starve this act of terrorism."

And while action against the terrorists is a point of emphasis, it’s the lives of the young girls that are the primary focus.

As a reminder, Mercy Sampson, who is known in the Indianapolis Nigerian community as Mama Calabar, read the names of some of those who have been kidnapped.

Mama Calabar is one of nearly 10,000 Nigerians living in Indianapolis.  She believes the gathering at Monument Circle can serve as a symbol of hope and inspiration for their native country.

"Everybody is crying out, talking to, trying to console people back home," she said.  "We that are here are doing what we are doing to show them that we are in concern and we are still talking to the United States and we reassure them back home that something great is going to happen."

Calabar is hosting a gathering to pray for the kidnapped girls Saturday morning at her restaurant at 54th and Keystone.

She says it’s another chance to show solidarity and bring attention to an issue that is taking too long to be resolved.