Gunmen escape with kids from a authorities major college in Kuriga city in Kaduna state.
Gunmen have attacked a college in northwestern Nigeria and kidnapped dozens of pupils as they had been about to start out the college day, native residents and authorities say.
Police in Kaduna state didn’t instantly touch upon the abductions, which occurred on the Native Authorities Training Authority College within the city of Kuriga on Thursday.
The variety of pupils taken was not instantly clear.
The assailants stormed the college shortly after morning meeting about 8am (07:00 GMT), taking the pupils hostage earlier than any assist might arrive, Joshua Madami, a youth chief within the space, instructed The Related Press information company.
“They had been surrounded from all angles and left with virtually 200 pupils and college students,” Madami mentioned.
In keeping with Salasi Musa, chairperson of the Chikun Native Authorities Space in Kaduna, the variety of pupils kidnapped was “way over 100”.
Abductions of scholars from colleges in northern Nigeria are widespread and have change into a supply of concern since 2014 when Boko Haram kidnapped greater than 200 schoolgirls in Borno state’s Chibok village.
In recent times, the abductions have been concentrated within the northwest and central areas, the place dozens of armed teams typically goal villagers and travellers for big ransoms.
The final main reported abduction involving schoolchildren was in June 2021 when gunmen took greater than 80 college students in a raid on a college within the northwestern state of Kebbi.
‘We don’t know what to do’
Dad and mom of the lacking kids instructed the Reuters information company that the gunmen began capturing sporadically on arrival on the college earlier than abducting the kids and escaping.
The varsity educates major and secondary college college students.
“We don’t know what to do. We’re all ready to see what God can do. They’re my solely kids I’ve on Earth,” Fatima Usman, whose two kids had been amongst these kidnapped, instructed Reuters by telephone.
One other mother or father, Hassan Abdullahi, instructed Reuters that native vigilantes had tried to repel the gunmen however had been overpowered.
“Seventeen of the scholars kidnapped are my kids. I really feel very unhappy that the federal government has uncared for us utterly on this space,” Abdullahi mentioned.
