CAN Raises Niger Abduction Toll To 315 From 227
The Christian Association of Nigeria has revised the number of abducted pupils and teachers from St. Mary’s Catholic Primary and Secondary Schools in Papiri, Niger State, raising the figure to 315 instead of the 227 earlier reported. According to CAN chairman Bulus Yohanna, the new total emerged after a detailed verification showed that dozens of children initially believed to have escaped were also taken. Parents later arrived at the school searching for their children, prompting a census that uncovered 88 additional missing pupils. The updated breakdown shows 303 students and 12 teachers are now unaccounted for. “After we left the school at Papiri, we made calls, conducted verification, and carried out further enquiries on those we thought escaped successfully, only to discover that 88 more students were also captured after they tried to escape. Parents we assumed had their children safe came asking for them, and that was when we realised they had also been abducted. This now makes it 303 students, including 12 teachers, bringing the total number of abducted persons to 315.” The abduction occurred in the early hours of Friday, between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m., when armed men on motorcycles stormed the school and carried out the mass kidnapping. Governor Mohammed Bago’s administration blamed the incident on the school’s alleged refusal to comply with a government directive ordering schools to shut down. However, Yohanna dismissed the claim, describing it as an attempt to deflect responsibility. “I was greeted with what I term propaganda that the school was given a prior warning through a circular. That is not true. We did not receive any circular; it must be an afterthought and a way to shift blame. In the past, when we heard of rumours of a security challenge, we shut down immediately. Is it now, when there is a circular from the government, that we would refuse to obey?” Yohanna added that both the education secretary and the National Association of Private Schools confirmed they never received or sent out any notice instructing schools to close. “Let them tell the world who they gave the circular to, or through what channel they sent it. Claims that the school was shut down and reopened recently are also not true. We are law-abiding.”