Nearly 500 men and boys were rescued in a building in Kaduna where it was reported that some of the detainees were sexually abused, tortured and starved, according to the police.
Not so long, some 300 young men were freed in a school in Daura, hometown of President Muhammadu Buhari in Kastina State, where children and students had been chained, hung from ceiling and beaten.
However, this has prompted the police to launch a crackdown on ‘torture houses’, informal Islamic schools, and rehabilitation centres and with this, nearly 1,500 people have been freed so far.
Timeline of events since the crackdown started
September 26, 2019: More than 300 boys and men, some as young as five, were rescued in a raid on a building that purported to be an Islamic school in Kaduna. Many were in chains and bore scars from beatings. Some had been there for years.
October 14, 2019: Police rescued 67 men and boys aged seven to 40 from an Islamic school in Daura, Katsina State, where the captives had been shackled. Former students said instructors had beaten and raped inmates.
October 16, 2019: Police freed about 500 men and boys, many of whom had been chained to walls, molested and beaten from an Islamic school in Katsina.
October 19, 2019: Police freed nearly 150 students from a reformatory school in Kaduna. At least 22 of the 147 released captives were female. Many of those freed had scars from abuse.
October 24, 2019: Police rescued 108 malnourished and sick captives aged six to 45 from a so-called Islamic reform centre in Ilorin, Kwara State.
November 4, 2019: Nigerian police releases 259 people held captive at an Islamic rehabilitation centre in Ibadan, Oyo State, with many of them chained.
