Abubakar Alhassan, the headteacher of an Islamiyya school located at Tegina in the Rafi Local Government Area of Niger State where bandits abducted 200 pupils on Sunday, has lamented government abandonment in the rescue efforts of the abducted May 31 lads.

According to Alhassan, who broke down in tears while narrating his ordeal on Friday, June 4, two parents of the abducted children have died of heart attack in the past two days due to the unfortunate event.

He spoke on Friday while featuring on Arise TV’s ‘The Morning Show’ programme monitored by The PUNCH.

The PUNCH had earlier reported that one person was reportedly shot dead while another was critically injured when gunmen abducted over 200 pupils from the Islamiyya school on Sunday.

Speaking on the television programme today, the headteacher, who was inconsolable, said no government official has been to the school to sympathise with the parents and management of the school.

He said, “All eyes are on me as the headteacher. I have witnessed the funeral prayer of one of the parents, very close to the school. She died. She has one child in the school. She was not around when the incident happened. When she came back, they told her that this was what happened and within 10 to 30 minutes, she fainted and that is the end of her. She died, that was the day before yesterday (Wednesday).

“One day after the incident happened, another parent, a woman died because she had two children. She sent one to the town. When she heard about the abduction, she died from heart attack.”

“Are we not Nigerians that the government cannot intervene in this issue?"

“No sympathy at all. None of the government officials extends sympathy to us. Are we animals? No, we are Nigerians,” Alhassan added.

The teary-eyed headteacher also said the bandits called him last night and increased the ransom for the abducted pupils from N110m to N200m.

Niger State in Nigeria’s North-Central has been a hotbed of killings and kidnappings of late as rampaging bandits terrorise the people of the state.

Just in February 2021, rampaging gunmen abducted scores of students and staff of Government Science College Kagara also in Niger State.

Though the abductees were later freed about 10 days later, it was not clear whether ransom was paid to secure their freedom even as the government said it used “kinetic and non-kinetic measures” in the process of securing the freedom of the abducted students and staffers.

Kidnapping has become a sordid menace and a lucrative ‘enterprise’ in Nigeria as the West African nation’s security situation worsens.