Let us start with a simple arithmetic that this government does not want us to do. On May 15, 2026, two sets of Nigerian children went to school with their bags and did not return home. One set was in Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State. The other set was in Mussa, in Askira-Uba Local Government Area of Borno State. Same day. Same circumstance. Same fate. Gunmen came and rustled them away like cattle.
Today is October 23. The Oyo children have been rescued, bathed, taken to hospital, discharged, and have reunited with their parents. The government announced their rescue with fanfare, with videos, and with claims that the kidnappers were arrested. After the Oriire abduction, in a frantic effort to secure their rescue, President Tinubu approved 1,000 forest guards. I am not aware if such effort was put in place to rescue the kidnapped students in Borno. But I am aware that those in Oyo were released while those in Borno are still in the bush, caged like animals in a zoo. This is painfully painful.
The Borno children are still in the bush. 160 days today. Five months and ten days. No video from the government. No presidential announcement. Only Amnesty International reminding us that they exist, that they are “Nigeria’s Forgotten Children.”
So I ask, what is the difference between an Oyo child and a Borno child? Is it the tribe? Is it the tongue? Is it because the President does not believe in one Nigeria, or because he believes some Nigerians are more Nigerian than others?
We were told a strategy worked in Oyo. A joint operation — Army, Police, DSS, NSCDC, Amotekun, vigilantes, hunters and even herbalists, if you add them. A beautiful cocktail of security that produced results. And most importantly, we were told, detaining beloved family members of kidnappers forced them to release the Oyo victims.
If that was the strategy that worked, why has the strategy gone on annual leave when it comes to Borno? Or is Borno too far? Is the road to Mussa longer than the road to Oriire?
The truth that we are too polite to say is this: The Nigerian government has a strategy for rescue, but it also has a strategy for selective rescue and forgetfulness. When it wants to rescue, it rescues. When it wants to forget, it forgets. The Borno children have been forgotten, perhaps because forgetting them carries no political cost.
We should thank God that the 20 prospective NYSC members who were kidnapped in Imo State were Yoruba from Oyo State, not Marghi, Chibok, or Kanuri from Borno State. Perhaps the story would have been different. The kidnapped victims were not only rescued, the ransom paid was said to have been returned. Who will rescue our children in Borno?
Let us ask the question again: could it be because those in Oyo are Yoruba and those in Borno are Marghi, Chibok, and other non-Yoruba northern tribes?
I did not ask the question. The people are asking it. In motor parks in Maiduguri, in suya joints in Kano, in waina joints in Bauchi, on the streets of Sokoto, they are asking: If these were Yoruba children from Iwo or Ogbomoso, would they have spent 160 days in the bush?
Would President Tinubu be comfortable seeking re-election while Yoruba children are cooling their feet in kidnappers’ dens? Would the South-West press allow it? Would Afenifere allow it? The answer is in the wind.
When Oyo children were kidnapped, the whole South-West stood up. NUT went on strike. Protests erupted in Oyo. The President ordered immediate action. When Borno children were kidnapped on the same day, what we heard was “hmmm.” The North has been silenced like an cursed region sedated into silence.
Is it wrong then for people to indict President Tinubu as Yoruba-centric, who only cares about the Yoruba? When you show Nigerians that you can rescue one set of children in 56 days and leave another set for 160 days, what do you expect them to call you? A nationalist?
To be frank, leadership is not about where you come from, it is about who you carry along. Today, Borno feels left behind — though the son of the soil is the Vice President.
Shettima is from Borno. He is from the same state as these children. He was governor of Borno. He knows Askira-Uba like the back of his hand. He is now the number two man in Nigeria. So I ask, what is the use of the Vice President?
In normal climes, if children from the Vice President’s state had been in captivity for 160 days, the Vice President would have relocated to that bush. He would have been crying, shouting, knocking on the President’s door every morning: “Sir, my children are still in captivity. I am ashamed of myself. I have failed my people.”
I am afraid, as tongues have been wagging, that Shettima is just a spare tyre who is only allowed to commission mosques and attend weddings.
If the Vice President of Nigeria, who is from Borno, cannot get 42 Borno children released, who then will speak for Borno? Who will speak for the Marghi child whose only crime was going to school on May 15?
This is painful. We have a Borno man as Vice President, and Borno children are the ones forgotten. We have a former Borno governor in Aso Rock, and Borno schools are still closed. What an irony.
Finally, my last point. How can a responsible government be comfortable having its school-going citizens cooling their feet in kidnappers’ dens and still boldly seek re-election?
Except the children in the kidnappers’ den in Borno are rescued, Tinubu does not have the moral right to campaign in Borno. But is the Tinubu/Shettima ticket aware of that? I doubt. Then, I checked the list of the twelve states Tinubu will likely visit for the 2027 campaign. Borno shockingly appears. Then I concluded that the President does not even know he has lost the moral right to campaign in Borno State.
Or what would Tinubu and Shettima tell the parents of these children? That “we tried our best?” That “security is complex?”
Honestly, a government that cannot secure its children has lost the moral right to ask those children’s parents for votes. You cannot keep children in captivity and keep campaigning for freedom. You cannot have children as hostages and have billboards saying “Renewed Hope.” Hope for who? Hope for the kidnappers?
May God bring the Borno children home. And may God give this government a conscience, even if it is a borrowed one.
Abdulkadir Salaudeen
salahuddeenabdulkadir@gmail.com
