As Nigeria joins the global community to mark this year’s Children’s Day on Wednesday, the 2023 Labour Party presidential candidate, Mr Peter Obi, has sounded the alarm over the worsening insecurity in schools, describing the repeated mass abduction of students as a national disgrace and a collapse of basic school safety.
In a statement posted on his verified X handle, Obi noted that while congratulatory messages were extended to Nigerian children, “my heart remains heavy and troubled, knowing that some Nigerian children have remained in captivity for years.”
The former Anambra State governor lamented that days, weeks, months, and even years have passed with schoolchildren languishing in kidnappers’ dens, while their “heartbreaking images still circulate on social media.”
He declared that “a nation that cannot protect its children from criminals has little but shame to present to the global community.”
Since the first high-profile school abduction in Chibok in 2014, kidnap-for-ransom gangs have continued targeting students across the northwest and north-central regions, with hundreds still unaccounted for. The latest incidents include the kidnapping of nearly 300 pupils from Kuriga, Kaduna State, earlier this year—some of whom remain missing.
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“No parent can bear the shame of being unable to protect his or her children, yet here we are as a nation, moving on while our children continue to suffer in forests and captivity for years,” Obi stated.
Authorities have repeatedly pledged to secure schools, but critics say implementation remains weak, with many rural schools lacking basic fencing, police presence, or emergency protocols.
