AFTER a combined seven months, scores of students of the Federal University Gusau, Zamfara kidnapped from their hostels and the eight Akwa Ibom State graduates abducted on their way to the National Youth Service Corps orientation camp in Sokoto State are still In kidnappers’ den, News Point Nigeria reports.
In September Bandits reportedly kidnapped a significant number of students of the Federal University Gusau, Zamfara State, in the early hours of day from their hostels.
An indigene of Sabon Gida village, Abubakar Sani, told this newspaper that the bandits, who were in large numbers, stormed the students’ off-campus residences in the village. He said the students abducted were mostly females.
Sani said the bandits invaded the area around 4:00am, where they attacked three students’ hostels.
He said, “Many of the kidnapped students were females, while other students were able to escape to the bush”.
According to Sani, the bandits only abducted the university students but did not abduct any residents of the village.
He said, “When they arrived the village, they went straight to the students [off campuses] and started shooting sporadically”.
“They later broke into the campuses and brought a number of students who are mostly females”.
Also, in August, some fresh graduates were abducted by gunmen on a highway in Zamfara State.
The prospective corps members from Akwa Ibom State were travelling in an AKTC bus to Sokoto State for the mandatory national youth service programme for Nigerian graduates.
Since the abduction of the Zamfara students and the Akwa Ibom corpers, parents and relatives of the victims have been expressing concerns that the authorities and security agencies were not doing enough to secure the release of their children.
Alhaji Muhammad Malami, one of the affected parents of Zamfara students, said they were in a dilemma, as according to him, they are left to search for the whereabouts of their children.
Malami lamented that government and the management of the institution have failed woefully in handling the situation. “It appears nothing is being done by both the government and management of the university to rescue our children.
“As I am speaking with you wallahi I and my wife are ill and we cannot sleep at all. We are always thinking of our daughter. I only recovered today. Had it been it was yesterday that you called, Wallahi I would not have been able to pick your call because I was critically ill. I was lying on bed throughout yesterday. In fact, since the abduction of my daughter, I and her mother fell sick and we have been battling with our health up till today.
“You can imagine scores of female students abducted and held in a bush for months and government is making no effort to rescue them. What type of leaders do we have in this country? Our leaders are joking with the lives of innocent citizens. This is terrible and unfortunate,” he lamented.
Alhaji Malami further said they are not being updated on the matter by the government, management of the university and security agencies, adding that “the trio have remained silent on the issue as if nothing happened to our children.
“Nobody cares to brief us about our children and this clearly shows that the authorities are not making any effort to rescue our daughters.”
On their parts, the parents of the Akwa Ibom corpers took to the street to protest, saying they had spent over N13m in an effort to have their children back.
The kidnappers had demanded that the parents of each of the abductees should pay a ransom of N10m, an amount the parents said they could not raise.
Despite the assurances from security agents that the victims would be released, none of them has been freed as of (today) December 4, 2023.
Efforts to get comment from the management of the Zamfara university were unsuccessful, as the information officer, Umar Usman, referred this reporter to the vice chancellor, Professor Mu’azu Abubakar, but the VC on his part did not respond to calls put to him.
All efforts to reach the Zamfara state’s Commissioner for Internal Security, Captain Bala Muhammad Mairiga (rtd), for comment, were also unsuccessful, as he neither picked up calls to his line by this reporter nor responded to SMS sent to him.
The Nigeria Police Force Public Relations Officer, Muyiwa Adejobi, has yet to reply to a text message sent to him by our correspondent as of the time of filing this report.