Nigeria’s row of kidnappings worsened on Saturday, 10 March, as more than a twelve students and four women were kidnapped from a school in Gada, Sokoto. Local MP Bashir Usman Gorau told that 15 students were among those kidnapped early on Saturday.
Nigeria’s army search intensifies for the hundreds of school children that were taken in the town of Kuriga on Thursday.
Yesterday, Kaduna’s state governor Uba Sani told the well known news agency said at least 28 of these children had escaped the kidnappers.
Thursday’s kidnapping which which had seen 280 students taken which was the biggest mass abduction from a school since 2021, the threat of security and safety intensifies in Nigeria.
Gangs of motorcycle-riding armed men took primary and secondary school children between the ages of eight and 15, school authorities and parents said.
Nigerian troops are working closely with police and local search teams to comb forests within Kaduna and neighbouring states, that may be involved in this issue.
Almost every family in the town is thought to have a child among those kidnapped, This is truly horrible on what is happening in Nigeria. One child, believed to be 14 years old, who had been shot by the gunmen and was being treated in hospital, has since died.
The kidnappings followed women and children taken from a remote town in Borno state the day before this incident occurred.
Mr Sani said the lack of troops and police men on the ground was the main reason for increased kidnappings in the area, which shows the deep security and safety problem in Nigeria.
Parents and relatives of the abducted children have formed unofficial law enforcement groups and are seeking help from neighbouring communities on the whereabouts of their children.
Nigeria’s Vice President Kashim Shettima is visiting Kaduna and is due to meet the governor of the area to discuss about these shocking kidnappings.
President Bola Tinubu said on social media he was confident the victims will be rescued.
He tweeted: “Nothing else is acceptable to me and the waiting family members of these abducted citizens. Justice will be decisively administered.”
Searches are also being made in Katsina and Zamfara states which are near the Kaduna state in Nigeria.
History of kidnappings in Nigeria
The Kaduna mass abduction has evoked memories of the nearly 300 girls in Nigeria’s north-eastern town of Chibok in 2014, this incident happening nearly 10 years after shows that this is clearly a pattern in the state.
In parts of northern Nigeria, parents are becoming weary of allowing their children to go to school over fear for their safety, a concern for safety and literacy rises the west African nation.
Kidnappings for ransom by armed men have become almost common in northern Nigeria, keeping thousands of children from attending school.
The last major abduction involving school children in Kaduna was in July 2021 when gunmen took more than 150 students, this is the recent mass kidnappings in the state, The students were re-united months later after their families have paid ransoms.
In 2022, Nigeria passed a law banning ransom payments to kidnappers and imposed a 15-year jail term for making them.
It also made abduction punishable by death in cases where victims die, a significant step to deal with this issue.But, has this been effective is the question.
There are current ongoing investigations that are happening regarding this matter an local authorities are working closely with the police, military, law enforcement and civilians affected and in threat of to rectify this issue and to liberate the children that were kidnapped in this latest row of kidnappings.
