Abuja: Around 100 schoolchildren kidnapped from a Catholic school in Nigeria last month were handed over to state officials Monday, a day after authorities secured their release. The children – many wearing football jerseys and girls in long robes – were driven into the Niger State Government House in white buses escorted by a dozen military vans and armoured vehicles.
According to Nam News Network, dozens of the 315 students and staff were abducted from the school in Minna, north-central Niger state. Fifty managed to escape shortly after the raid, leaving the fate of 165 others still unclear. State governor Umar Bago expressed his commitment to ensuring the safe return of all the children. “I want to reassure parents and guardians of these children that they will be safely delivered to them and very soon,” he said during an address to the students and officials.
The rescued children will undergo medical checks before being reunited with their families, the governor added. As he shook hands with some of the children, he led them into a hall where the state emir and local officials were present to receive them. “Today is fundamental and very important in redefining the history of this state,” Bago stated.
According to a list of the released children, most of those freed are aged between 10 and 17 years, though the school catered for children as young as nursery school age. It remains unclear who seized the children from their boarding school in the remote rural Papiri village or the circumstances surrounding the release of the 100.
While kidnappings for ransom have become a common way for criminals and armed groups to make quick cash, the recent spate of mass abductions has put an uncomfortable spotlight on Nigeria’s already grim security situation. The news of their release coincided with the Nigerian military’s intervention in neighbouring Benin, conducting countercoup operations after a group of soldiers announced a coup bid in the former French colony.
Nigeria faces a long-running jihadist insurgency in the northeast, with armed bandit gangs conducting kidnappings and looting villages in the northwest. In November, assailants across the country kidnapped two dozen Muslim schoolgirls, 38 church worshippers, a bride and her bridesmaids, with farmers, women, and children also taken hostage.
The kidnappings have also occurred amidst a diplomatic offensive from the United States, where former President Donald Trump has alleged that mass killings of Christians amount to genocide, threatening military intervention. The Nigerian government and independent analysts have rejected this framing, which has long been used by the Christian right in the United States and Europe.