Bandits who abducted 121 students of the Bethel Baptist High School in Kaduna, North-West Nigeria have released 28 of their captives after reportedly receiving N50m as ransom.
News Central gathered that the students had spent 20 days in captivity before their release on Sunday. The children arrived at the school premises, located at Damishi in the Chikun Local Government Area of the state around 11.21 am.
Anxious parents and guardians, whose wards are part of the 87 schoolchildren still in the bandits den, were surprised their captors were still keeping them after the payment of N50m of the N60m initially demanded as ransom.
Reports have it that after the school and some parents raised the ransom, the bandits directed them to take the money to a designated location.
Rev Israel Akanji, the President of the Nigerian Baptist Convention (NBC), in a chat with newsmen on Sunday after the released students were reunited with their parents, said no other ransom was paid by the church because the church is against the payment of ransom to kidnappers.
Rev Akanji assured parents that all the students would soon be reunited with them, adding that there were still 87 students in the kidnappers den.
While three students were rescued earlier, Akanji provided no explanation as to how he arrived at the remaining 87 students in the bandits’ den.
The proprietor of the school, who doubles as the President of the Kaduna Baptist Conference, Rev. Ishaya Jangado, while placating the anxious parents said the bandits said they would release the students in batches.
“God has answered our prayers. By the grace of God, I have been talking to these people (bandits) and they told me they would be releasing the children in batches. They are in batches and they have released the first batch. I am trusting God that very soon again, others will come, he said.
