Panic at Abuja school as students mistake soldiers for kidnappers

By Omeiza Ajayi

ABUJA: A routine security operation at Government Day Secondary School, Dutse, Abuja, nearly descended into chaos on Monday after some students misconstrued the arrival of soldiers as an attempted kidnapping, triggering panic across the premises.

The confusion, which mirrors growing public anxiety amid recurring terror attacks across the country, comes barely a week after pupils in Rukubi, Doma Local Government Area of Nasarawa State, similarly mistook a group of hunters for armed kidnappers.

A visit by Vanguard showed that many students were visibly unsettled, reflecting the heightened fear that now accompanies daily school activities in vulnerable communities.

According to school officials, the institution routinely invites police officers or soldiers to secure the campus during major examinations – particularly on days when general subjects such as English, Mathematics, Biology, or Economics are being written. But on this occasion, the sight of the soldiers sparked a misunderstanding.

Witnesses said a student, either as a result of mischief or genuine fear, misread the presence of the uniformed personnel and raised a false alarm, claiming bandits had stormed the school. The rumour spread quickly, prompting a wave of panic as some students bolted in different directions and others attempted to scale the fence.

A senior administrative staff member, who asked not to be named, dismissed speculation of an attack, insisting the incident was nothing more than a misunderstanding. “Nothing happened today, there were no kidnappers or kidnapping at the school but just soldiers,” the official said.

The staff member added that the school was conducting major examinations and had invited security personnel as a precaution. “Currently we are writing exams, and today we wrote one of our general papers, mathematics and economics, and as usual on days like this, tensions are high. So, we had to curb these children’s excesses by inviting security personnel for safety.

“This is the school rule to either engage the police or the army. So, we engaged the army and they came to man the gates for the exams to be peaceful.”

The official noted that the panic was fuelled by students’ tendency to amplify fears among themselves. “You know children, they can always incite tensions among themselves. So, one of them saw the army and said the insurgents are around and that was how they started running.

“Some attempted to jump the school fence, but it was the soldiers who told them to come back, but they didn’t run out of the school.

“We wrote the exams today, I even invigilated today and everyone left peacefully.”

The scare came just hours after the Federal Capital Territory Police Command disclosed that it had thwarted a planned large-scale kidnap operation within Abuja, following a string of recent abductions in ACO Community, Gwagwalada, and Bwari.

The Police Public Relations Officer, SP Josephine Adeh, said intelligence indicated that a criminal network intended to launch another attack on “a community” on or before December 1, 2025.

The police statement didn’t mention the name of the said “community”, a development that has also sent panic among some residents in the suburbs.

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