Following the kidnapping of many private school students in Dankara, Katsina State, BBC Hausa spoke to a schoolgirl who survived the kidnapping on Friday.
The student, who was asked by the BBC for his parents’ consent before the interview, said that on Friday night after coming back from school around 9:30, they heard gunshots fired within the air, and later noticed that even the attackers entered the varsity .
He said:”Everyone came out and that we ran up the wall. After we climbed the wall they wont to light our lights and tell us to return back.”
According to the scholar , it had been then that they rotated and returned, thinking that the lads were security officers, but later realized that they weren’t .
How many of you’ve got been kidnapped?
“After we were taken into the forest, one among them ordered us to prevent and count our belongings before continuing our journey,” said the young man, whose name was withheld.
He said that once they were counted, it had been found that they were 520 in number.
“We kept walking within the bush, we were being pushed and beaten, we spent the night walking, half-hour before dawn we were told to travel to bed and rest,” he said.
How did you survive?
The student told BBC Hausa: “After they sat us down I leaned back a touch . I found the side of a tree and that i turned my back on them. I lay down and straightened my legs.”
“After everyone left, I came crawling and searching until I entered the town ,” he said.
He said albeit God helps an individual to flee from the hands of the people you are doing not know where to travel because only the forest are often seen, so only God saved him from their hands, as he said.
The student made the remarks as authorities said local security forces were hunting down the gunmen in an attempt to rescue the opposite abducted students.
Katsina State Governor Aminu Bello Masari said 333 students were still being held by the militants.
Garba Shehu, a spokesman for the Nigerian president, told the BBC that several children had fled, saying only 10 children had escaped.
According to him, the youngsters who escaped from the hands of the attackers said only 10 children were within the hands of thieves and therefore the number of scholars identified by the varsity teachers.
“Some of the youngsters who fled the bush said that 10 children were being held hostage by the gunmen,” he said.
However, President Buhari has been criticized by locals who say he should have gone to Kankara himself to ascertain what happened rather than sending officialdom since he was in Katsina State.
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