A senior United States senator has issued a stern condemnation of the Nigerian government following the abduction of schoolgirls in Kebbi State, declaring that the country will be held responsible for its persistent failure to protect students from militant groups.
Senator Jim Risch, the ranking member of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, voiced his outrage in a statement posted on the social media platform X on Tuesday. The lawmaker pointedly criticised what he described as a long-standing pattern of negligence.
“Nigeria has long failed to protect its schoolchildren from jihadist and criminal abductions, and little has changed,” Senator Risch wrote.
He emphasised the particular vulnerability of young girls, stating they “remain prime targets for enslavement, forced conversion, and ransom.” The American senator concluded his message with a firm warning, noting, “As the U.S. engages the Nigerian government on the persecution of its most vulnerable citizens, we will continue to hold them accountable.”
The senator’s rebuke comes just days after a deadly assault on the Government Girls Comprehensive Senior Secondary School in Maga, Kebbi State. Armed gunmen stormed the school, killing the vice principal and seizing 25 students. The attack has triggered a wave of national anguish and drawn sharp international criticism.
Echoing the sentiments, another US lawmaker, Riley Moore, also took to X to condemn the incident. “Please join me in praying for the 25 girls who have been kidnapped and for the repose of the soul of their vice principal, who was killed,” Moore wrote.
He further suggested a sectarian dimension to the attack, noting it “occurred in a Christian enclave in Northern Nigeria,” and asserted that “The Nigerian government must do more to end the rampant violence.”
In response to the escalating crisis, President Bola Tinubu has dispatched Vice President Kashim Shettima to Kebbi State to sympathise with the state government and reassure the distraught parents and guardians of the abducted students. The federal government has pledged to secure the swift release of the schoolgirls.
Concurrently, the Chief of Army Staff, Lieutenant General Waidi Shaibu, has issued a direct order to troops involved in the search-and-rescue operation, codenamed ‘Operation FANSAN YANMA’. During a visit to the state, General Shaibu commanded the soldiers to intensify their efforts.
“You must continue day and night fighting. We must find these children,” the army chief told the frontline troops, urging a “ruthless determination to succeed” in the mission.
According to reports from Zagazola Makama, a publication focused on counter-insurgency, the army chief arrived in Kebbi with a delegation of senior officers and held an operational meeting with commanders on the ground before addressing the troops directly.
The abduction in Kebbi has reignited painful memories of similar mass kidnappings, such as the 2014 Chibok incident, and has put the government’s security strategies and the management of the Safe School Initiative under renewed and intense scrutiny.
