44 students and teachers who were abducted two months ago from schools in southern Nigeria have been freed. But several soldiers died rescuing them. Some of the kidnappers were arrested. The BBC reports that
The freed captives are currently receiving medical treatment at an undisclosed hospital and will return home at a later date….
A renewed wave of mass kidnappings has hit Nigeria in recent months, and insecurity remains a major issue ahead of next year’s general election.
The government says it is stepping up security around schools and vulnerable communities but critics say it is not enough.
In this case the victims were kidnapped by gunmen on 15 May from three schools in the district of Osiire, in Oyo state: Baptist Nursery and Primary School, LA Primary School, and Community Grammar School.
Oyo State is a relatively prosperous area of southwestern Nigeria. “Its capital is Ibadan, the third most populous city in the country and formerly the second most populous city in Africa.”
In November, 50 abducted Catholic schoolchildren escaped captivity and returned to their families.
Over 150 Christians were slaughtered in Nigeria’s Plateau State in the first half of 2025.
In 2024, gunmen kidnapped 227 children from a school in Kaduna State, which is just west of Plateau State.
Over 500 people were slaughtered in eastern Nigeria in December 2023 by marauding terrorists from neighboring Cameroon in central Africa.
In the U.S., Nigerian immigrants sometimes work as prison guards: “Many states and countries have difficulty finding enough people willing to be prison guards. It’s not fun to be in a prison or around criminals, and prison guards can be attacked. Immigrants are often willing to be prison guards, though. So the United Kingdom has guest-worker visas for prison officers. Prison guards in Texas and the United Kingdom are disproportionately from Nigeria. Nigerians help keep U.S. prisons staffed, too, as is explained in the article ‘Nigerians Flock to Work in U.S. Prisons.’”
