Gunmen storm secondary school, kidnap over 300 girls in Nigeria

Hundreds of girls have been kidnapped in Nigeria by unidentified armed gunmen who stormed a secondary school in the town of Jangebe in Zamfara state.

About 300 girls have been reported missing from the boarding school after the gunmen raided the town. However, some pupils managed to hide from the bandits according to a member of staff.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, the staff said: "The gunmen in their hundreds invaded the town around 2am on Friday, shot sporadically in the air to scare the residents before coming into the school.

"After taking away most of the students, we rounded up those that escaped or hid from the bandits and conducted a census where we counted 55 students and we are still searching to see if we can get more."

The school had 421 students at the time of attack and only 55 had been accounted for.

The raid comes barely a week after at least 40 people, including 27 students, were kidnapped last week in Kagara, in neighbouring Niger state, and they are yet to be released.

In 2014, the world’s attention was drawn to the rampant raids on schools in Nigeria when 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped in the north-eastern town of Chibok by Boko Haram militants.

Yesterday’s attack happened early in the morning and the gunmen are reported to have forced the girls in vehicles and drove off with them at around 3am.

Worried parents have gathered outside the school and some have gone out into the bush to look for their daughters, witnesses say.

A statement from the police say that they have deployed officers and a military contingent to the town Jangebe to search for the abducted girls.