By Adeyinka Adeniran
In an emotional and chilling account of survival, the rescued school Principal, Community High School, Ahoro-Esinele, Mrs Racheal Alamu on Monday narrated how her captors brutally executed two teachers during their 56-day captivity in the bush to terrorize the victims and force concessions from the government.
She spoke in a remark at the Executive Chamber of the Governor’s Office, Oyo State government Secretariat, Agodi, Ibadan during a handing over ceremony of the rescued vitoms to the State government.
The event had in attendance all the rescued teachers and pupils.
Recounting the harrowing ordeal that began on Friday, May 18, Mrs. Alamu explained that the kidnappers deliberately weaponized psychological torture and cold-blooded murder to bend the state to their will.
According to her, the execution of her colleagues, Mr. Mathew was a calculated tactical maneuver by the bandits.
“Mr. Micheal was killed on the second day of our stay, but Deacon was killed on the first Sunday of June,” Mrs. Alamu said, her voice heavy with the memory of the executions.
“They killed them purposely because they felt that will force the hand of the government to give them whatever they want.”
Throughout the two-month nightmare, the hostages were subjected to relentless psychological warfare aimed at breaking their resolve. The bandits routinely told the captives that they had been abandoned by their country and that their lives held no value to the authorities.
“So many times they used fear to subdue us. At a point, they told us that the government would not be interested in our case again because they did not value us.”
Despite the captors’ aggressive attempts to induce despair, Mrs. Alamu noted that the hostages clung to a fragile sense of hope, drawing strength from the belief that the nation was standing with them in spirit.
She stated that even in their darkest moments, they held onto the “hope that we will come out alive,” comforted by the conviction that Nigerians were actively praying for their safe return.
It was only after their rescue by security forces that the survivors realized the magnitude of the domestic and international attention their abduction had garnered.
Mrs. Alamu admitted that they had arrived at a point where they believed they had been forgotten entirely by the outside world.
“It was until we got out that we discovered that the whole world was interested in our case. We thought that we were a write-off,” she said.
Expressing immense gratitude to the President, the Governor, security officers, and everyone involved in the rescue operation, Mrs. Alamu extended her deepest appreciation for the efforts that ensured their survival, while noting that the path to long-term recovery from the trauma has just begun.
“We have scars already. We believe with time, we will heal. And we pray that those that lost their lives, Allah will console the family,” she sai
