[2][3][4] Prior to the raid, the school had been closed for four weeks due to deteriorating security conditions, but the girls were in attendance in order to take final exams in English.

[15] The resulting crackdown led to the capture or killing of hundreds of Boko Haram members, with the remainder retreating to mountainous areas from which they began increasingly to target civilians.

[17] On 6 July 2013, armed men from Boko Haram attacked Government Secondary School in Mamudo, Yobe State, killing at least 42 people.

[15] On 29 September 2013, armed men from Boko Haram gained access to the male hostel in the College of Agriculture in Gujba, Yobe State, killing forty-four students and teachers.

[24][25] On the night of 14 April 2014, members of the Islamic jihadist terrorist group Boko Haram[26][27] attacked the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok, Nigeria, a majority Christian village.

A few hours prior to the raid, residents in Chibok had received phone calls from neighbouring villages warning them of the incoming attack, who had witnessed convoys containing armed insurgents driving in the direction of the town.

[33] Some girls were loaded into vehicles and the rest had to walk several miles until other trucks came to take them away,[32] possibly into the Konduga area of the Sambisa Forest, a former nature reserve covering 60,000 km2 where Boko Haram were known to have fortified camps.

[33] An unidentified senior military source believed that the girls may have been split up and placed in different Boko Haram camps, around Lake Chad, the Gorsi mountains and the Sambisa forest.

[22][32][35] In the immediate aftermath of the attack, local vigilantes and parents searched the Sambisa forest in an attempt to locate and rescue some of the kidnapped girls, however were unsuccessful in finding any of the captives.

[68] It was reported on 26 June that the Nigerian government had signed a contract worth more than $1.2 million with Levick, a Washington, D.C. public relations firm to work on "the international and local media narrative" surrounding the Chibok schoolgirl kidnapping.

Via an opinion column in The Washington Post, Jonathan attributed his silence to a desire not to compromise the details of security efforts being carried out to rescue the girls.

[73] Two weeks later, Zakaria Mohammed, a high-ranking member of Boko Haram, was arrested at Darazo-Basrika Road while fleeing from counterinsurgency operations around the Balmo Forest.

[74][75] Stephen Davis, a former Anglican clergyman, contacted three Boko Haram commanders who said they might be prepared to release Chibok schoolgirls and went to Nigeria in April 2015.

[76] By May, the Nigerian military had reclaimed most of the areas previously controlled by Boko Haram in Nigeria[77] including many of the camps in the Sambisa forest where it was suspected the Chibok girls had been kept.

Although many women previously held captive by Boko Haram had been freed as the Nigerian military reclaimed these areas,[78] none of the Chibok girls were found.

[79] President Muhammadu Buhari, who gained power through the 2015 Nigerian general election, stated in December that he was willing to negotiate with Boko Haram for the release of the Chibok girls without any preconditions.

Chibok schoolgirl Amina Ali Nkeki was found on 17 May by the vigilante Civilian Joint Task Force group in the Sambisa Forest, along with her baby and Mohammad Hayyatu, a suspected Boko Haram militant who claimed to be her husband.

[89] On 21 May 2016, Amir Muhammad Abdullahi, who claimed to be the Boko Haram second in command and speaker for several senior militants, offered to surrender so long as they would not be harmed, and in return they would release hostages, including the Chibok girls.

[90] In August the Nigerian military announced they had launched an air attack on Boko Haram's headquarters in the Sambisa Forest, claiming to have killed several commanders and seriously wounded the leader Abubakar Shekau.

[99] Two days later, Pogu Bitrus, the chairman of the Chibok Development Association, claimed that more than 100 of the missing girls apparently did not want to return home because they had either been brainwashed or were fearful of the stigma they would receive.

The spokesman for the army, Sani Usman, said that she was found in Pulka, Borno State whilst screening escapees from Boko Haram's Sambisa forest base.

[110] U.S. President Donald Trump met Chibok schoolgirls Joy Bishara and Lydia Pogu at the White House on 27 June, who were due to start education at Southeastern University in Florida.

[113] In July Nigerian police arrested and charged eight Boko Haram fighters allegedly involved in the kidnapping,[114] with one defendant convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

[135] On the same day, the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Abdulaziz Al al-Sheikh, joined other religious leaders in the Muslim world in condemning the kidnappings, describing Boko Haram as misguided and intent on smearing the name of Islam.

[153] Ibrahim M Abdullahi, a lawyer in Abuja, the capital of Nigeria, started the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls in a tweet posted in April 2014[52][154] after listening to the former Federal Minister of Education Oby Ezekwesili speak on the kidnappings at an event at Port Harcourt.

Naomi Mutah and Saratu Angus Ndirpaya, two women who were involved in the leadership and organization of the protests, were detained by the Nigerian police reportedly because the First Lady of Nigeria, Patience Jonathan, "felt slighted" when they were sent to attend a meeting instead of some of the mothers of the kidnapped girls.

[162] Daily rallies by Bring Back Our Girls demonstrators at the Unity Fountain in Abuja were continuing to at least 5 January 2015, despite efforts by the police to shut down such protests.

[163][164] To mark a year since Boko Haram kidnapped the girls, on 13 April 2015 hundreds of protesters wearing red tape across their lips walked silently through the capital Abuja.

[166] Notable participants included Malala Yousafzai,[153] Hillary Clinton,[166] Chris Brown[166] Forest Whitaker,[153] and First Lady Michelle Obama, who was photographed holding up a sheet of paper with the hashtag to support the movement[167] and gave a public address on the kidnappings a few days later.

[189][190] Irish writer Edna O'Brien's award-winning novel, Girl, published in 2019, offers an imaginative idea of what the experience of being kidnapped, even ultimately leading to escape, might have been like through the eyes of a single schoolgirl.