Twenty-four schoolgirls abducted from Government Girls’ Day Secondary School, Maga, in Sokoto/Kebbi border axis, have regained their freedom following coordinated security operations.
The students were kidnapped on November 17 when gunmen invaded their school community in Sakaba Local Government Area of Kebbi State.
This was as the bandits shot and killed the school’s Vice-Principal, Hassan Yakubu Makuku, and a security guard for resisting.
A statement on Tuesday by his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, President Bola Tinubu welcomed the release of the 24 schoolgirls.
Related news: DSS Intel Failed To Stop 25 Maga Schoolgirls’ Abduction- Governor Alleges
According to him, Tinubu applauded the security agencies for the efforts made to secure the freedom of all the victims taken away by the terrorists.
He tasked the security agencies to intensify efforts to rescue the remaining students still being held captive.
“I am relieved that all the 24 girls have been accounted for. Now, we must, as a matter of urgency, put more boots on the ground in vulnerable areas to avert further incidents of kidnapping. My government will offer all the assistance needed to achieve this,” President Tinubu said.
Terrorists struck the school at dawn on November 17 and abducted the girls moments after a military detachment allegedly left the premises.
The attackers killed the school’s Vice Principal, Malam Hassan Makuku, before abducting the schoolgirls.
The Kebbi incident triggered similar kidnappings in Eruku, Kwara State, and Papiri in Niger State.
All 38 kidnapped victims in Eruku were freed on Sunday. On the same day, the Niger State Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria said 50 of the missing students of the Catholic school in Niger had been found in their parents’ homes.
Three days after the Kebbi abduction, the Chairman of Danko-Wasagu Local Government Area, Hussaini Aliyu, released the names of the schoolgirls.
Aliyu gave their names as follows:
Senior Secondary School 2A
1. Fatima Sani Zimri
2. Hafsat Ibrahim
3. Nana Firdausi Jibril
4. Masauda Yakubu Romo
Senior Secondary School 2B
5. Hauwa Saleh
6. Hauwau Umar Imam
Senior Secondary School 3A & 3B
7. Salima Garba Umar
8. Salima Sani Zimri
9. Amina G. Umar
10. Rashida Muhammad Dingu
11. Saliha Umar
12. Aisha Usman
13. Jamila Iliyasu
14. Maryam Illiyasu
15. Najaatu Abdullahi
16. Zainab Kolo
Junior Secondary School 3A
17. Surraya Tukur
18. Hafsat Umar Yalmo
19. Maryam Usman
20. Amina Illiyasu
21. Ikilima Suleman
Junior Secondary School 2
22. Khadija Nazifi
23. Hauwa’u Iliyasu
24. Hauwa’u Lawali
25. Ummu Kulsum Abdulkarim
Abductions
There has been a recent spike in attacks and abductions by bandits, especially in the northern part of the country.
The Kebbi, Niger and Kwara abductions are the latest in a resurgence of the mass kidnappings that have long harrowed Africa’s most populous country.
In February 2021, bandits kidnapped 317 schoolgirls from the Government Girls Science Secondary School Jangebe in Jangebe, Zamfara State.
The incident happened at the all-female school located in the Talata-Mafara Local Government Area of the state.
The same month, gunmen raided the Government Science College Kagara, in the Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, and abducted students, teachers, and their family members from the school.
Twenty-seven students were among the 41 abductees.
In December 2020, bandits took three hundred and three students of Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina, into captivity.
In 2018, 110 students were kidnapped after Boko Haram invaded the Government Girls Science Technical College (GGSTC) in Dapchi on February 19, 2018.
There was global outrage when Boko Haram attacked the Girls Secondary School in Chibok, a town on the border between Borno and Adamawa states, and abducted about 200 students in April, 2014.
