Just In: Police Begin Documentation of Kidnapped Niger Students, Teachers

Laleye Dipo in Minna

The Police have begun the documentation of students and teachers kidnapped at Papiri town of Agwara local government of Niger state last week.

Already, the police on Friday invited parents of the affected students and teachers to appear before its officers to give details of those missing.The action of the Police, it was learnt, followed lack of credible statistics on the number of children kidnapped, those that have returned and reunited with their parents.

It was claimed that over 259 students as well as 13 teachers were kidnapped by terrorists while 66 escaped from their den in unknown circumstances.

Police Public Relations Officer, Niger State Police Command, SP Wasiu Abiodun, confirmed this to THISDAY in a telephone interview.

Abiodun said, “We invited the parents to come and give us information about the children, including those that have reunited with their parents”.He however did not say how many names have been put on the register now opened.

Governor Mohammed Umaru Bago in an interview with the Hausa Service of the BBC also said government had not been able to confirm the number of students abducted from the school neither was he able to say how many victims have been recovered.

Governor Bago in the interview alleged that the school was ordered closed since 2021, adding that government never gave a counter order for the reopening of the school before disclosing that investigation into the issue would be carried out at the appropriate time.

The governor also said the missionary that established the school had since relocated to Ireland while the foreign road construction workers that managed the institution after had left the area.