By Matilda Ikediobi Tales of students being abducted from schools have become all too common in Nigeria, but until recently, nothing of the sort had ever been recorded in Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State. That changed on the fateful morning of May 15, when gunmen stormed Community High School, Ahoro-Esinle, and Yawota Baptist Nursery and Primary School, abducting 39 pupils and seven teachers. As the attackers descended on the schools, pupils writing their tests screamed: “Bandits, bandits.” In this interview with Nigeria Info FM, one of the abducted teachers, Olatunde Zacheus, recounts the dramatic attack, their capture and the harrowing 56 days they spent in the terrorists’ den. Excerpts: What happened on that day? How did the terrorists come, take you and your colleagues away? That day, I slept over in that community. I do come to school from Ogbomoso, but I stayed in the community that day. When I went to school, the students started arriving. When they came, I was the only staff in school. So, I took the students in Junior Secondary School, JSS, one to three to the school hall to conduct tests for them without waiting for my other colleagues to arrive because I know the difficulties we do encounter when coming to school. It could be a flat tyre, mechanical fault, technical fault and others. I divided the students and started conducting the test with the hope that other staff would join. When the others started arriving, including a junior colleague and another on my level, I told them to invigilate the Senior Secondary School, SSS one and two classes. Later on, our principal arrived. When she arrived, another younger staff member came to greet me, whom I told to go and monitor JSS2 while I monitored JSS one and three. Myself and the junior colleague were at the back of the school. We were not in front. So, we didn’t know much about what happened. However, we heard the movement of a bike. Immediately, we heard the shot of guns. They were shooting sporadically. We heard our students shouting bandits, bandits. Prior to that time, I had arthritis on my left leg. So, I was unable to walk. If it was a self-owned work, I would not have gone to school that week. The next thing I saw were students jumping from the window, including the junior staff with me. They ran into the bush. So, I also jumped through the window. However, when I wanted to land, I landed with the left leg, where I had arthritis. Immediately, I was unable to walk. All the other students who flew through the window were there with me and we moved together. I only managed to move until we got to a spot and I was unable to move again. So, I told them to please go and not worry about me. I was sure the abductors would not capture me. The cloth I wore that day was green. The colour of the cloth was the same in the grass where I hid. So, I laid down inside the grass, hid there and used one of the thick leaves to cover my leg. Immediately, I saw another student coming towards me. She took pity on me and shouted: “master.” I told her to go and not feel pity for me because I knew what to do. The colour of our uniform is white and brown, and I knew that it would sell us out easily. I told her to move, but she did not listen. She stayed in my front. When their commander came, he didn’t see me. He passed by me without knowing. When he got to the student, he armpited the student and the student smiled. When the student smiled and looked at the position I was, their commander also looked towards that direction and saw me. Initially, he was not sure. So, he opened his mask and told me to stand up. That was how I was captured. How is your leg and overall health? When we were going to where we were held captive, it was miraculous. The leg I had tried to treat in many hospitals, bought many medicines and used suddenly relieved me. When I got there and complained to our abductors, they gave me one drug. When I took it, the arthritis disappeared. You were in captivity for 56 days. Have you had any such incident in the community before that incident? This is between the fifth and sixth year that I have been working in that school. Although we heard things about bandit attacks, this is the first one that pertained to coming to school to abduct staff and students. What kind of support have you received? The utmost support for now should be health. Governor Seyi Makinde has tried his best. We have all been discharged from the hospital except for maybe two or three kids. In terms of financial support, we don’t know what government is doing. The governor said he would support the families. One person supported us while we were in Ibadan. He gave us envelopes. For our principal, we heard she has been given two or three cars, but I don’t know how sure it is. How did you survive for 56 days? Were you being fed by these terr
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