30 die when militants set school ablaze
Associated Press
POTISKUM, Nigeria — Islamic militants attacked a boarding school before dawn Saturday, dousing a dormitory in fuel and lighting it ablaze as students slept, survivors said. At least 30 people were killed in the deadliest attack yet on schools in Nigeria’s embattled northeast.
Authorities blamed the violence on Boko Haram, a radical group whose name means “Western education is sacrilege.”
The militants have been behind a series of recent attacks on schools in the region, including one in which gunmen opened fire on children taking exams in a classroom.
Saturday’s attack killed 29 students and English teacher Mohammed Musa, who was shot in the chest, according to another teacher, Ibrahim Abdu.
Police officers who arrived after the gunmen left and transported the bodies to the hospital confirmed at least 30 people were killed.
“We were sleeping when we heard gunshots. When I woke up, someone was pointing a gun at me,” Musa Hassan, 15, told The Associated Press of the assault on Government Secondary School in Mamudo village in Yobe state.
He put his arm up in defense, and sustained a gunshot that blew off all four fingers on his right hand. The militants moved on after shooting him.
Hassan recalled how the gunmen came armed with jerry cans of fuel that they used to torch the school’s administrative block and one of the dormitories.
“They burned the children alive,” he said with wide eyes.
He and teachers at the morgue said dozens of children from the 1,200-student school escaped into the bush, but have not been seen since.
On Saturday, at the morgue of Potiskum General Hospital, a few miles from the scene of the attack, parents screamed as they attempted to identify the victims, many charred beyond recognition.
Some parents don’t know if their children survived or died.
Malam Abdullahi found the bodies of two of his sons, a 10-year-old shot in the back as he apparently tried to run away, and a 12-year- old shot in the chest.
“The gunmen are attacking schools and there is no protection for students despite all the soldiers,” he said as he wept over the two corpses. He said he is withdrawing his three remaining sons from another school.
By Saturday afternoon, thousands’ of students had fled several boarding schools around Potiskum, leaving deserted campuses in fear of more attacks.