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Officials in Nigeria have ensured the liberation of 100 kidnapped students captured by attackers from a religious school last month, according to a UN source and regional news outlets on Sunday. Yet, the whereabouts of another one hundred and sixty-five students and staff believed to remain held captive was unknown.

Background

In November, three hundred and fifteen people were taken from a co-educational residential school in central Niger state, as the nation faced a surge of large-scale kidnappings similar to the well-known 2014 Boko Haram kidnapping of female students in Chibok.

Approximately 50 got away shortly afterward, resulting in 265 believed to be still held.

The Release

The one hundred students are due to be released to state authorities on Monday, stated by the UN official.

“They are scheduled to be handed over to state authorities on Monday,” the official told a news agency.

Regional reports also stated that the release of the students had been achieved, without offering information on if it was done through dialogue or armed intervention, nor on the whereabouts of the other students and staff.

The freeing of the 100 children was confirmed to the press by a government spokesperson Sunday Dare.

Reaction

“For a long time we were anxiously awaiting for their release, if this is confirmed then it is wonderful event,” said a representative, representing the local diocese of the religious authority which manages the school.

“Yet, we are not formally informed and have not been duly notified by the government.”

Wider Crisis

Although kidnappings for ransom are common in the nation as a method for criminals and armed groups to fund their activities, in a spate of mass abductions in November, hundreds were abducted, putting an harsh focus on the country's deteriorating law and order crisis.

The country faces a protracted Islamist militant uprising in the north-east, while marauding gangs conduct abductions and loot communities in the northwestern region, and clashes between agricultural and pastoral communities regarding diminishing land and resources continue in the middle belt.

On a smaller scale, armed groups connected to secessionist agendas also operate in the country’s volatile southeastern region.

Historical Precedent

A most prominent mass kidnappings that garnered worldwide outrage was in 2014, when about three hundred schoolgirls were taken from their school in the northeastern town of Chibok by Boko Haram jihadists.

Now, the country's kidnap-for-ransom problem has “become a organized, revenue-generating industry” that raised around $1.66 million dollars (£1.24m) between July 2024 and June 2025, stated in a analysis by a Lagos-based research firm.