More than three hundred schoolchildren and a dozen teachers were abducted on Friday during an attack on St Mary’s Catholic School in Niger State, according to the Christian Association of Nigeria. The updated count was released on Saturday after church officials completed a full verification exercise.
The mass abduction, one of the largest recorded in recent years, has intensified concern about rising insecurity across north-central and northwestern Nigeria. It also follows another school attack earlier in the week, adding pressure on federal authorities as communities demand stronger protection.
The Niger State chairman of CAN, the Most Reverend Bulus Dauwa Yohanna, said the number of abducted pupils rose from the initial figure of two hundred fifteen after officials carried out a detailed census at the school compound. He visited St Mary’s on Friday shortly after armed men stormed the grounds.
Security teams have been deployed alongside local hunters to track the kidnappers, though no group has claimed responsibility for the assault. According to Reuters and AP, authorities have not yet disclosed the exact route the attackers took after fleeing into nearby forest areas.
Satellite imagery shows the St Mary’s complex stretching across dozens of buildings, including classrooms and dormitories, linked to an adjoining primary school in Papiri town. The site sits near a main road between Yelwa and Mokwa, an area that has seen rising militia activity in recent years.
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Residents described frantic scenes as parents searched for their missing children. Dauda Chekula, a sixty two year old resident, told The Associated Press that four of his grandchildren, aged seven to ten, were among those taken.
“We do not know what is happening now, because we have not heard anything since this morning,” he said, explaining that children who escaped fled in several directions. “The only information we are getting is that the attackers are still moving with the remaining children into the bush.”
In Kebbi State, roughly one hundred seventy kilometers away, armed men abducted twenty five schoolgirls on Monday in a similar raid. Local officials said one girl escaped, while twenty four remain missing.
The Niger State government said on Friday that it received intelligence pointing to increased threats in the area before the attack. In a statement, the secretary to the state government said the school had reopened “without notifying or seeking clearance from the State Government, thereby exposing pupils and the staff to avoidable risk”.
