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Gunmen have kidnapped over 300 students and teachers in what appears to be the most significant collective seizures in recent Nigerian experience, as stated by a Christian organization on Saturday.

Escalating Emergency in Educational Facilities

The pre-dawn Friday raid on St Mary's co-educational school in Niger state came just a short time after gunmen attacked a secondary school in adjacent Kebbi state, seizing 25 young women.

Initial accounts had indicated 227 victims were seized, but revised figures surfaced after a detailed assessment confirmed that 303 students and 12 instructors had been abducted.

The kidnapped pupils, aged between eight and 18 years, constitute nearly 50 percent of the school's overall enrollment of 629.

Official Reaction and Security Actions

Local authorities have announced that intelligence departments and police are currently performing a thorough census to determine the precise number of abducted people.

In response to the increasing safety concerns, the local authorities has directed the closure of every schools in the state, with nearby states adopting comparable precautionary steps.

Additionally, the federal education department has directed the temporary shutting of 47 boarding secondary schools throughout the country.

President Bola Tinubu has postponed international engagements, including participation at the G20 summit in Johannesburg, to focus on addressing the crisis.

Latest Violent Incidents

The school abductions constitute the latest in a sequence of security breaches that have shaken the nation, including an attack on a church in the west of Nigeria where gunmen shot dead two people and abducted dozens worshipers during a live-streamed service.

These events have taken place against the backdrop of global attention on Nigeria's security situation.

Past Background

Nigeria continues to be scarred by the legacy of the mass abduction of almost 300 schoolgirls by jihadist group Boko Haram in Chibok over a ten years ago, with several of those girls still unaccounted for.

Firsthand Testimonies

In a concerning video clip shared by Christian organizations, a frightened worker described hearing the noise of bikes and vehicles before hearing "violent banging" on multiple entrances of the school premises.

"Children were weeping," the witness reported, recounting her fear while searching for access to the section where the screaming was most intense.

The local Catholic authority stated that the "assailants operated aggressively and without interruption for almost three hours, moving through sleeping quarters."

Citizen Response and Fears

Meanwhile, about 600km away on the outskirts of Abuja, concerned guardians were collecting their children from educational institutions following the shutdown order.

One parent, a 40-year-old nurse, expressed her shock at the magnitude of the kidnapping, questioning how 300 children could be taken at once.

She stated that the "authorities is failing to act to curb insecurity," and voiced support for external intervention to "resolve this crisis."

Continuing Safety Challenges

For years, heavily armed criminal gangs have been carrying out killings and abductions for money in remote areas of northwest and central Nigeria, where government control is limited.

While nobody has claimed responsibility for the recent attacks, bandit gangs seeking ransom payments frequently attack schools in countryside locations where security is inadequate.

These groups maintain camps in extensive forest areas spanning several states in the west of Nigeria.

Although these bandits have no political motives and are mainly driven by financial gain, their increasing cooperation with jihadist groups from the northeastern region has become a significant cause of worry for authorities and experts alike.