Nigeria's School Kidnapping Crisis
Newshour
BBC
4.2 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 29 November 2025
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
After the kidnapping of hundreds of children, we hear from a Nigerian minister about the difficulties that the government has in providing security to the Nigerian people. The government has declared a nationwide security emergency and ordered the recruitment of 20,000 more police.
Also on the programme: President Trump has said he'll pardon the former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, who's serving a prison sentence in the United States on drugs and weapons charges; and an award winning children's programme about communist politics in Soviet era East Germany
(Photo: Nana Aisha Shemsudeen teaches her younger siblings and neighbors at her parents' house in Minna following the closure of all government schools due to insecurity in Niger State, Nigeria Credit: Marvellous Durowaiye)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:09.0 | Hello and welcome to News Hour from the BBC World Service coming live from London. |
| 0:14.3 | This is Owen Bennett Jones. |
| 0:16.0 | More than 250 children abducted from a Catholic boarding school in Nigeria's central state of Niger last week are still being held captive. |
| 0:26.3 | And there by no means the only group of children being held hostage. |
| 0:29.5 | It is a terrible situation and apparently very difficult for the state to take effective action. |
| 0:35.4 | The government has declared a nationwide security emergency |
| 0:38.8 | and it's ordered the recruitment of 20,000 more police. But a senior Roman Catholic cleric, |
| 0:45.5 | Bishop Bulustawa Johanna, has accused the local police of making no meaningful effort |
| 0:50.4 | to rescue the schoolgirls taken last week. We asked him why he felt compelled to criticize |
| 0:56.1 | the police. Well, you know, when something happens, you know, everyone is worried to see that |
| 1:02.2 | something immediately is taking place so that all hands are on deck. I know when you have an issue |
| 1:08.5 | and you don't speak out, maybe nobody will know that you have a problem. |
| 1:12.9 | Well, I would say the police are wrong. |
| 1:14.5 | They are also taking orders, but something needs to be done very fast. |
| 1:18.9 | So I'm not blaming anybody, you know, because I'm not in charge of the police. |
| 1:23.6 | Our one is to say that our students, pupils and teachers are rescued. |
| 1:28.9 | And I believe that it is the work of the security people or agencies. |
| 1:33.4 | It is very hard to know when a blind man is sleeping. |
| 1:36.5 | It has never been so bad like this time around, you know. |
| 1:40.5 | Over the years, the other place, we have not had any serious security challenges. |
| 1:45.0 | It's just in recent time that this is happening. |
... |
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