LAGOS, Nigeria – Gunmen have kidnapped more than 300 students and teachers in one of the largest mass kidnappings in Nigeria, a Christian group said during the weekend, as security fears mounted in Africa’s most populous nation.
The early Friday raid on St Mary’s co-education school in Niger state in western Nigeria came after gunmen on Monday stormed a secondary school in neighboring Kebbi state, abducting 25 girls.
The Christian Association of Nigeria had earlier reported 227 people seized, but the new number came “after a verification exercise” that concluded 303 students and 12 teachers were abducted.
The number of boys and girls – aged between eight and 18 years – kidnapped from St Mary’s is almost half of the school’s student population of 629.
The Nigerian government has not commented on the number of students and teachers abducted.
Niger state governor Mohammed Umar Bago said on Saturday the intelligence department and police were “doing the head count”.
Bago, whose government had ordered some schools shut, also announced the closure of all schools in his state as attention focuses on rescuing the students and teachers.
Nearby states have also shuttered all their schools as a precautionary measure.
The national education ministry has also ordered 47 boarding secondary schools across the country be shut.
President Bola Tinubu has cancelled international engagements, including attending the G20 summit in Johannesburg, to handle the crisis.
The two abduction operations and an attack on a church in the west of the country, in which two people were killed and dozens abducted, have happened since US President Donald Trump threatened military action over what he called the killing of Christians by radical Islamists in Nigeria.
