5 of her kids were abducted from a Nigerian school. All she has left is hope and prayers

KURIGA – Rashidat Hamza is in depression. All however one of her six youngsters are a number of the nearly 300 students abducted from their college in Nigeria’s conflict-battered northwest.

More than two days after her youngsters — ages 7 to 18 — went to university in far flung Kuriga the city best to be herded away by means of a band of gunmen, she used to be nonetheless in surprise Saturday.

“We have never seen this kind of thing where our children were abducted from their school,” she informed an Associated Press workforce that arrived within the Kaduna State the city to document on Thursday’s assault. “We don’t know what to do, but we believe in God.”

The kidnapping in Kuriga used to be just one of 3 mass kidnappings in northern Nigeria since late last week, a reminder of the safety disaster plaguing Africa’s maximum populous nation. A bunch of gunmen abducted 15 youngsters from a college in some other northwestern state, Sokoto, sooner than break of day Saturday, and a few days previous 200 folks were abducted in northeastern Borno State.

It used to be in Borno’s Chibok the city a decade in the past that college kidnappings in Nigeria burst into the headlines with the 2014 abduction of greater than 200 schoolgirls by means of Islamic extremists, stunning the arena.

No crew claimed duty for any of the new abductions. But Islamic extremists waging an insurgency within the northeast are suspected of wearing out the abduction in Borno. Locals blame the varsity kidnappings on herders who’re in clash with the settled communities.

Among the scholars abducted Thursday were a minimum of 100 youngsters elderly 12 or more youthful. They were simply settling into their study rooms on the govt number one and secondary college when gunmen “came in dozens, riding on bikes and shooting sporadically,” mentioned Nura Ahmad, a instructor.

The college sits by means of the street simply on the front of Kuriga the city, which is tucked within the heart of forests and savannah.

“They surrounded the school and blocked all passages … and roads” to forestall assist from coming sooner than marching the youngsters away in an operation that lasted lower than 5 mins, Ahmad mentioned.

Fourteen-year-old Abdullahi Usman braved gunshots in making his get away from the captors.

“Those who refused to move fast were either forced on the motorcycles or threatened by gunshots fired into the air,” Abdullahi mentioned.

“The bandits were shouting: Go! Go! Go!” he mentioned.

By the next day to come, Nigerian police and infantrymen headed into the forests in seek of the kids however combing the wooded expanses of northwestern Nigeria may take weeks, observers have mentioned.

“Since this happened, my brain has been scattering,” mentioned Shehu Lawal, the daddy of a 13-year-old boy who is amongst the ones abducted.

“My child didn’t even eat breakfast before leaving. Even his mother fainted. … We were worried, thinking she would die,” Lawal mentioned.

Some villagers like Lawan Yaro, whose 5 grandchildren are a number of the abducted, say their hopes are already fading into concern.

People are used to the area’s lack of confidence, “but it has never been in this manner,” he said.

“We are crying, looking for help from the government and God, but it is the gunmen that will decide to bring the children back,” Yaro said.

“God will help us,” he said.

Since the 2014 abduction in Chibok of 276 schoolgirls, which sparked the global #BringBackOurGirls social media campaign, at least 1,400 Nigerian students have been seized from their schools in similar circumstances. Some are still in captivity including nearly 100 of the Chibok girls.

But schools are not the only targets.

Thousands of people have been abducted across Nigeria in the last year alone, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project. The crisis has even hit homes in the capital of Abuja, where President Bola Tinubu took office after being elected last year following a campaign in which he promised to resolve kidnappings.

A major factor that conflict analysts say has fueled the abductions is how easy it is to smuggle in arms over Nigeria’s poorly policed borders. More than half of its 1,500-kilometer (932-mile) border with Niger, for instance, stretches across the northwest. Though mostly savannah, the region also has vast forests that are ungoverned and unoccupied, providing havens for organized gangs and their kidnap victims.

In 2022, Nigerian lawmakers passed a bill to bar ransom payments, but Nigeria’s kidnappers are known for brutality, prodding many families to scramble to pay a ransom.

Fatigued by the 14-year Islamic insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast, the military continues to conduct air raids and special military operations in the region. But the armed gangs continue to grow in numbers and often work with the extremists who are seeking to expand their operations beyond the northeast.

“Their mentality is that they should be allowed free rein to do what they please in the northwest and that if the state challenges them, directly or indirectly, they will have to respond and show their strength,” Barnett said.

More than a dozen checkpoints and military trucks now dot the 55-mile (89 kilometers) road that runs from Kuriga town to the city of Kaduna. But the soldiers are likely to soon be deployed elsewhere, whenever a new security incident requires that troops provide a presence.

People in Kuriga can only hope that the schoolchildren return unhurt and that the security they feel now with the military trucks around endures.

“We hope for help from the government so that they will arrest the attackers,” mentioned Hamza, the mum frightened for her 5 abducted youngsters. “The gunmen don’t allow us to farm, they don’t allow us to have peace outside … we don’t have security — no soldier, no police.”