The teen lived with her family in the village of Lahadin Makole, close to Kano in Nigeria.
Contending with chronic pain, she was practically immobile and spent most of her waking hours in a plastic bowl, which her family transported her around in.
Her mother Fadi said: "From six months when she learnt how to sit that was when it began. She didn't learn how to crawl.
"She started with a fever and that was it. Then stomach pains. Then her body parts like hands and legs. She cannot use any if the ache strikes."
For much of her life Rahma's family would carry her in her bowl, with her brother Fahad taking her into Kano each day to beg for handouts. However, last year a journalist, Ibrahim Jirgi, gave the family a wheelchair.
The Haruna family experienced an upturn in their fortunes when local freelance photographer Maikatanga shared images of Rahma on social media, which prompted an inundation of requests from strangers who wanted to help in any way they could.
Despite her severe disability, Rahma had entrepreneurial ambitions: "I want to start a business," she said in July this year. "A grocery store and anything people buy, that is what I want."
- With Telegraph UK
