No fewer than 15 Tsangaya students at Gidan Bakuso area of Gada Local Government Area in Sokoto State have been abducted by bandits in the area.
It was learnt that the incident occurred at about 1am on Saturday at the school premises.
Proprietor of the school, Liman Abubakar, who confirmed the incident,
said, “So far, 15 students were unaccounted for, but we are still counting.
“They invaded the town around 1am, shot one person and abducted a woman in the process.
“As they were leaving the town, they sighted our students rushing into their rooms and they kidnapped many of them.
“We have so far counted 15 who are missing and we are still searching for more.”
Abubakar said it was not the first time the village would be attacked by bandits, but they had never kidnapped any of their students until now.
A resident of the town, Mansur Ahmadu, said the bandits invaded the community in the middle of the night.
Also confirming the incident, a member, representing Gada-East constituency at the state House of Assembly, Kabiru Dauda, said he received a call from the village around 2am that they were invaded by bandits.
“I reached out to the local government authorities and security agencies and I am sure they are doing something about it,” he said.
Spokesman for the Sokoto State Police Command, ASP Ahmad Rufa’i, said the command had deployed a team to ascertain the real situation.
He said, “Most of your colleagues has been calling me on this but honestly I just spoke with the Divisional Police Officer of the affected community.
“We have mobilised our men to ascertain what actually happened, I can assure you that we are on top of the situation. I will brief you on it.”
Last Thursday, about 287 pupils and teachers of Government Secondary School and LEA primary school at Kuriga, Kaduna State were abducted by bandits, a development that generated national outrage.