A view of the varsity bus of the Authorities Women Complete Secondary College, the place gunmen on Monday attacked the varsity dormitory and kidnapped schoolgirls, is seen in Kebbi, Nigeria, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2025.
Tunde Omolehin/AP
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Tunde Omolehin/AP
MAGA, Nigeria — A schoolgirl who was kidnapped with 24 others from a dormitory in northwestern Nigeria has escaped and is secure, the varsity’s principal informed The Related Press on Tuesday, as hunters joined safety forces within the seek for the lacking college students in forests near the varsity.
The women had been kidnapped earlier than daybreak on Monday, when gunmen attacked the dorm on the Authorities Women Complete Secondary College in Kebbi state’s Maga city. Native police mentioned the gunmen scaled the fence to enter the varsity premises and exchanged gunfire with cops earlier than seizing the ladies and killing a employees member.
No group has claimed duty for taking the ladies, however analysts and locals say gangs of bandits typically goal colleges, vacationers and distant villagers in kidnappings for ransoms. Authorities say the bandits are largely former herders who’ve taken up arms in opposition to farming communities after clashes between them over strained sources.
Mass college kidnappings are particularly frequent in northern Nigeria, and the Kebbi college is near battle scorching spots together with Zamfara and Sokoto states, the place a number of gangs are recognized to function and conceal out.
The coed who escaped arrived dwelling late Monday, hours after the kidnapping, in keeping with the varsity principal Musa Rabi Magaji. One other scholar was in a position to escape the gunmen within the minutes after the raid and was not kidnapped, the principal informed AP.
“They are safe and sound,” Magaji mentioned.
A video verified by AP exhibits the 2 schoolgirls, who look like of their early teenagers, misplaced in thought and surrounded by household and different villagers, with hijabs overlaying their heads. Excessive schoolers in Nigeria are normally aged between 12 and 17.
Intensified rescue efforts
Safety forces and hunters, in the meantime, have intensified efforts to search out and rescue the others, native officers mentioned. Safety groups swept close by forests the place gangs typically cover whereas others had been deployed alongside main roads resulting in the varsity.
Kebbi Gov. Nasir Idris visited the varsity on Monday and guaranteed of efforts to rescue the ladies, and Nigeria’s Chief of Military Workers Lt. Gen. Waidi Shaibu met with troopers within the hours after the assault and directed “intelligence-driven operations and relentless day-and-night pursuit of the abductors,” in keeping with a military assertion.
“We must find these children. Act decisively and professionally on all intelligence. Success is not optional,” the military chief mentioned.
Households recount predawn assault
By Tuesday morning, the dorm and the classroom block — a strolling distance aside — had been abandoned. In Maga, households ready for information of their youngsters’s freedom expressed anger and frustration.
Resident Abdulkarim Abdullahi, whose daughter and granddaughter — aged 13 and 10, respectively — had been among the many kidnapped youngsters, mentioned he overheard the noise from his home.
“I was at home when I suddenly heard gunshots from the school. We were told that the attackers entered the school with many motorcycles,” mentioned Abdullahi.
Amina Hassan, spouse of the varsity vice principal Hassan Yakubu Makuku, mentioned the assailants broke into their home, which is on the varsity premises, and fatally shot her husband. He was additionally the varsity’s chief safety officer.
“Three of them entered and asked my husband, ‘Are you Malam Hassan?’ and he responded, ‘Yes, I am.’ They told him that we are here to kill you,” she informed the AP.
College abductions are a method to attract consideration
Not less than 1,500 college students have been seized within the area since Boko Haram jihadi extremists seized 276 Chibok schoolgirls over a decade in the past. However bandits are additionally energetic within the area, and analysts say gangs typically goal colleges to realize consideration.
Analysts and residents blame the insecurity on a failure to prosecute recognized attackers, and the rampant corruption that limits weapons provides to safety forces whereas guaranteeing a gradual provide to the gangs.
“Let’s say people have been kidnapped in the markets — it doesn’t go far, (or) if people have been kidnapped on the road — it doesn’t go far,” mentioned Oluwole Ojewale, a safety analyst on the Institute for Safety Research. “What gains traction is when (it is) strategic kidnapping, like school children.”
