Bandits Whipped Us So El-Rufai Would Send Them N500m, Says Freed Kaduna Student

Francis Paul, one of the five students of the Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation, Mando, Igabi Local Government Area of Kaduna State, released by bandits who raided their school on March 11, 2021, has said the bandits whipped them in a viral video to force Governor Nasir El-Rufai to pay them the N500 million ransom they demanded.

The bandits had invaded the school, which is opposite the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA), and abducted 39 students.

Paul said the video released by the bandits was real. He also dismissed suspicions that the female students, who were shown in the video with wrappers, were raped.

He also revealed that they were poorly fed, saying the bandits gave them rations of a substance he had no idea of its components.

“I feel a bit better. It’s just the medication after the release but I am now better. I am one of the students abducted by bandits on March 11, 2021.

“It was on the 11th of March that we were taken from the hostel. The bandits came and woke us from our sleep and took us out of the compound. They told us to lay on the ground.

“After they asked us to lay down on the ground, they took us through where they broke the fence with digger outside the school.

“It was when they took us through the fence out of the hostel that we saw many of them outside with bikes. It was from there that they took us from one place to another.”

“It was really true (the video). They were flogging us just because they wanted us to talk about the money they want from the government. They said if they see that they are flogging us the government will be serious to send the money to them. No one was raped.”

Explaining how he got his freedom, Paul said the bandits had selected five students one afternoon and drove them to a village, asking them to ask for another village when they got to the main road.