All 279 Nigerian girls kidnapped from their boarding school in the northwestern state of Zamfara have been released and are on government premises, the local governor said yesterday.
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari expressed “overwhelming joy” over the release of the girls from days of captivity, vowing tougher action against kidnappers.
Nigeria has been rocked by four mass abductions of students in less than three months, sparking widespread anger against the government and memories of the 2014 kidnapping of hundreds of schoolgirls in Chibok, in the country’s east, that shocked the world.
Photo: Reuters
“I am happy to announce that the girls are free,” Zamfara Governor Bello Matawalle told reporters early yesterday. “They have just arrived in the government house and are in good health.”
An Agence France-Presse reporter saw hundreds of girls wearing hijabs gathered at the government premises.
Authorities initially said 317 girls were abducted in the raid by hundreds of gunmen on the Government Girls’ Secondary School in Jangebe Village on Friday last week.
However, Matawalle said the “total number of female students abducted” was 279.
“We thank Allah they are all now with us,” he added.
Footage showed minibuses pulling up in the night with students inside and lines of girls filing into a building.
Government officials had been in talks with the kidnappers, known locally as bandits.
A source said “repentant bandits” had been contacted to reach out to their former comrades as part of efforts to free the students.
Heavily armed criminal gangs in northwest and central Nigeria have stepped up attacks in the past few years, kidnapping for ransom, raping and pillaging.
The Nigerian military deployed to the area in 2016 and a peace deal with bandits was signed in 2019, but attacks have continued.
In December, more than 300 boys were kidnapped from a school in Kankara, in Buhari’s home state of Katsina, while he was visiting the region.
The boys were later released, but the incident triggered outrage and memories of the kidnappings of 276 schoolgirls by extremists in Chibok.
Many of those girls are still missing.
The gangs are largely driven by financial motives and have no known ideological leanings. However, there are concerns they are being infiltrated by armed Islamists.
Authorities have denied paying any ransom to secure the recent releases, although analysts say this is unlikely and security experts fear that this would lead to an increase in kidnappings in these regions plagued by extreme poverty.
Buhari, who has been criticized for failing to deal with the unrest, had insisted that he would “not succumb to blackmail by bandits.”
He said in a statement he was excited the schoolgirls were freed without any incident, adding that “being held in captivity is an agonizing experience not only for the victims, but also their families and all of us.”
He urged “the police and the military to go after these kidnappers and bring them to justice.”
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