Police in Katsina State have rescued eighty-four kidnap victims, mostly Islamiyya schoolchildren, from the hands of bandits in Mahuta village of Dandume Local Government Area of the state.
This follows a distress call received on Saturday at about 2200hrs, by the DPO Dandume, that some Islamiyya students of Hizburrahim Islamiyya, Mahuta village, numbering about eighty, were attacked while on their way back from Maulud occasion celebrated at Unguwan Alkasim village.
In a statement released on Sunday by the Police Spokesman, SP Gambo Isah, the students were accosted by bandits who had already kidnapped four (4) persons and rustled twelve (12) cows from Danbaure village in Funtua LGA of the state trying to escape into the forest.
On receipt of the report, he said, the DPO led Operations “Puff Adder,” Sharan Daji and vigilante group to the area and engaged the bandits into a fierce gun duel.
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“Subsequently, the teams succeeded in dislodging the bandits and rescued all the eighty-four (84) kidnapped victims and recovered all the twelve rustled cows. Search parties are still combing the area with a view of arresting the injured bandits and/or recovery of their dead bodies. Investigation is ongoing,” Isah noted.
Targeted Group
In recent years, kidnappers have targeted schools mostly in the northern part of the country, raising fears about the safety of learning institutions in Nigeria.
Just last week, over three hundred students of the Government Science Secondary School in Kankara, Katsina State were freed by their abductors, ending fears that the schoolchildren may not reunite with their parents.
“I congratulate the governor [Aminu Masari] that the schoolboys have been successfully released,” President Muhammadu Buhari had said after the boys, who have now been reunited with their parents, were freed by their captors.
“I congratulated the governor and the army for organising the operation and sacrament of the abductors in getting the release of the children.”