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Nigerian
governor
says 279
kidnapped
schoolgirls
are
freed
By
LEKAN
OYEKANMI
apnews.com
GUSAU,
Nigeria
-
Hundreds
of
Nigerian
schoolgirls
abducted
last
week
from a
boarding
school
in the
northwestern
Zamfara
state
have
been
released,
the
state’s
governor
said
Tuesday.
Zamfara
state
governor
Bello
Matawalle
announced
that 279
girls
have
been
freed.
The
government
last
week
said 317
had been
kidnapped.
Gunmen
abducted
the
girls
from the
Government
Girls
Junior
Secondary
School
in
Jangebe
town on
Friday,
in the
latest
in a
series
of mass
kidnappings
of
students
in the
West
African
nation.
An
Associated
Press
reporter
saw
hundreds
of girls
dressed
in light
blue
hijabs
and
barefoot
sitting
at the
state
Government
House
office
in
Gusau.
After
the
meeting,
the
girls
were
escorted
outside
by
officials
and
lined up
to be
taken
away in
vans.
They
appeared
calm and
ranged
in ages
from 10
and up.
Matawalle
said
they
would be
taken
for
medical
examinations
before
being
reunited
with
their
families.
“Alhamdulillah!
(God be
praised!)
It
gladdens
my heart
to
announce
the
release
of the
abducted
students
of GGSS
Jangebe
from
captivity.
This
follows
the
scaling
of
several
hurdles
laid
against
our
efforts.
I enjoin
all
well-meaning
Nigerians
to
rejoice
with us
as our
daughters
are now
safe,”
Matawalle
said in
a post
on
Twitter
early
Tuesday.
At
the time
of the
attack,
one
resident
told AP
that the
gunmen
also
attacked
a nearby
military
camp and
checkpoint,
preventing
soldiers
from
responding
to the
mass
abduction
at the
school.
One
of the
girls
recounted
the
night of
their
abduction
to the
AP.
“We
were
sleeping
at night
when
suddenly
we
started
hearing
gunshots.
They
were
shooting
endlessly.
We got
out of
our beds
and
people
said we
should
run,
that
they are
thieves,”
she
said.
“Everybody
fled and
there
were
just two
of us
left in
the
room.”
The
attackers
held
guns to
the
girls’
heads,
she
said.
“I
was
really
afraid
of being
shot,”
she
said,
adding
that
they
asked
for
directions
to the
staff
quarters
and the
principal.
“We said
we don’t
know who
she is.
They
said the
principal
is our
father
and they
will
teach us
a
lesson.”
Police
and the
military
had
since
been
carrying
out
joint
operations
to
rescue
the
girls,
whose
abduction
caused
international
outrage.
President
Muhammadu
Buhari
expressed
“overwhelming
joy”
over the
release
of the
girls.
“I
join the
families
and
people
of
Zamfara
State in
welcoming
and
celebrating
the
release
of these
traumatized
female
students,”
he said
in a
statement.
“Being
held in
captivity
is an
agonizing
experience
not only
for the
victims,
but also
their
families
and all
of us.”
The
president
called
for
greater
vigilance
to
prevent
bandits
from
carrying
out such
attacks.
He
urged
police
and
military
to
pursue
the
kidnappers,
and
warned
that
policies
of
making
payments
to
bandits
will
backfire.
“Ransom
payments
will
continue
to
prosper
kidnapping,”
he said.
The
terms of
the
female
students’
release
were not
made
immediately
clear.
Nigeria
has seen
several
such
attacks
and
kidnappings
in
recent
years.
On
Saturday,
24
students,
six
staff
and
eight
relatives
were
released
after
being
abducted
on
February
17 from
the
Government
Science
College
Kagara
in Niger
state.
In
December,
more
than 300
schoolboys
from a
secondary
school
in
Kankara,
in
northwestern
Nigeria,
were
taken
and
later
released.
The
government
has said
no
ransom
was paid
for the
students’
release.
The
most
notorious
kidnapping
was in
April
2014,
when 276
girls
were
abducted
by the
jihadist
rebels
of Boko
Haram
from the
secondary
school
in
Chibok
in Borno
state.
More
than 100
of those
girls
are
still
missing.
Boko
Haram is
opposed
to
western
education
and its
fighters
often
target
schools.
Other
organized
armed
groups,
locally
called
bandits,
often
abduct
students
for
money.
The
government
says
large
groups
of armed
men in
Zamfara
state
are
known to
kidnap
for
money
and to
press
for the
release
of their
members
held in
jail.
Experts
say if
the
kidnappings
continue
to go
unpunished,
they may
continue.
___
AP
writers
Sam
Olukoya
in
Lagos,
Nigeria
and
Carley
Petesch
in
Dakar,
Senegal
contributed.
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