Meetings with their parents began late in the day.
“Since this incident, I have not been able to sleep, but now I can sleep,” said Salisu Kankara, a parent of one of the students who was released.
The relatively rapid release of the more than 330 boys came after a prompt response from the government, which appears to have learned from previous kidnappings of mass schools, especially schools in Chibok, which did not have such a happy outcome.
The students’ nightmare began on the night of December 11, when they were captured by men armed with AK-47 rifles from the government science school for boys in Kankara village in Katsina state in northwestern Nigeria. They were marched through a forest and forced to lie in the dirt, amid gunfights between their captors and the troops pursuing them.
The boys described walking through bushes and various forests, stopping during the day and walking at night without shoes, stepping over thorns and stones.
Nigeria’s jihadist rebels, Boko Haram, have claimed responsibility for the abduction, saying they attacked the school because they believe Western education is not Islamic.
While the boys’ parents were eagerly awaiting any news, many in Nigeria and around the world were preparing for a long hostage situation. Many feared that the boys would be forced to become child soldiers for Boko Haram.
The abduction reached an unexpectedly satisfactory climax when Katsina Governor Aminu Bella Masari announced the release of 344 boys late Thursday night.
“I think we can say … we’ve recovered most, if not all, of the boys,” he said.
Masari told the Associated Press that no ransom was paid to secure the boys’ freedom. It is unknown at this time what he will do after leaving the post.
Masari said the government will work with police to increase security at Kankara School and other schools. Only one police officer was working at the school when she was attacked, according to the students.
The abduction of schoolchildren was a worrying reminder of Boko Haram’s previous attacks on schools, especially the mass abduction in April 2014 by Boko Haram of more than 270 schoolchildren in a government boarding school in Chibok, northeastern Borno State. About 100 of these girls are still missing.
“The difference, we know in this case, is that the government has moved faster,” said Bulama Bukarti, an analyst in sub-Saharan Africa at the Tony Blair Institute.
In Chibok, weeks of advocacy and shouts from Nigerians, celebrities and the international community were needed before the government acknowledged that the girls had been abducted and taken action. At that time, Boko Haram had the opportunity to put the girls in smaller groups and move them away, making it difficult to find them.
This time, the government deployed quickly after the boys were abducted and the kidnappers quickly found themselves surrounded, Bukarti said.
Their release is “a fantastic story at the end of a terrible week,” he said. “Parents will reunite with loved ones … all of Nigeria will breathe a sigh of relief for a good ending.”
UNICEF Nigeria Representative Peter Hawkins called on the attackers to release any other children who could be detained from this or other attacks.
“Schools should be safe. Children should never be the target of the attack and yet, far too often in Nigeria, they are just that – victims of attacks on their schools,” he said.
He called on the Nigerian government to put in place better interventions “to ensure that schools are safe and that all Nigerian children can learn without fear.”
President Muhamadu Buhari welcomed the release of the boys and met with all of them on Friday, encouraging them to continue their education despite the attack and abduction they endured.
“This little difficulty you have faced in life should not discourage you. You should prepare, get up and pursue your dreams in life,” he said. “Because I went to school, I grew up to be president twice, so education is the key to success. Do everything you can to gain education and even religious knowledge so that it can guide you and your family in the future. “
After their release late on Thursday, Buhari said his government must do more to keep schools safe from such attacks and protect the lives and property of Nigerians, acknowledging that the Northwest is a real challenge to his administration.
Many thorny issues remain in Nigeria.
The abduction shows that Boko Haram has managed to recruit armed gangs in northwestern Nigeria, a worrying sign as criminal gangs have stepped up attacks in the region this year, killing more than 1,100. Although the bandits have no ideological motives, Bukarti said, it has become clear that Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has managed to form alliances with some of them.
“Shekau started courting some bandits,” Bukarti said in January, referring to a video released by Boko Haram leader explaining his ideology and speaking in the last 15 minutes in Fulani, the language of most northwestern bandits. , including those who spoke in the video released by Boko Haram this week. Boko Haram later claimed to have entered parts of the northwest.
Although the future may not be clear, the abduction of the boarding school shows that it was a clear recruitment, and Bukarti says he will go so far as to appoint local Boko Haram associates.
Boko Haram could expand its coverage to the northwest, he said, adding that they had also received publicity.
“This was a major propaganda point and that is why Boko Haram and terrorist groups survive,” he said.
Although the government’s response to this abduction has been swift – they had a rescue mission until the next day – criticism remains over how the government is managing the violence and how it will continue to grow in the West African nation.
Many Nigerians blame Buhari for security failures in the country, and the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) says the kidnapping of students in Katsina, the president’s home state while visiting there, raises other serious questions about to the government’s ability to fight the insurgency.
The PDP said President Buhari’s inability to manage Nigeria’s security had opened up the country “to terrorists, bandits, vandals and insurgents”.
The attack on the Kankara school highlights the weakness of security institutions in Nigeria, said Prof. Odion-Akhaine. He fears that the country is heading for anarchy due to growing insecurity.
“If there is anarchy in Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, it will have a serious effect on the subregion,” he said.
Copyright © 2020 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.