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For Umar Ahmed, the nightmare began with confusion.
Gunmen arrived at his school in Kankara in northwestern Nigeria on Friday night, just as he and his colleagues were about to go to bed.
His first thought was that the men were paramilitaries, civilians who assume a police role, “so we were not afraid,” the 18-year-old told AFP.
But then, the intense shooting began.
Vigil of a mother: a woman whose child was kidnapped waits at school. By Kola Sulaimon (AFP) “We were terrified. Some of us ran to the perimeter fence trying to escape, while others hid inside.”
“They kept yelling that we should go back, that they were at the school to rescue us. And most of us went back.”
In an operation that left the country reeling, hundreds of students were detained that day at the Government Science High School for boys and taken away.
Initially, the disappearance was attributed to so-called bandits, criminal groups in the region that for years have terrorized communities by killing and kidnapping people for ransom.
But on Tuesday, Boko Haram, the feared group that kidnapped hundreds of school children in Chibok in 2014, claimed responsibility.
The kidnapping took place hundreds of miles (kilometers) away from the Boko Haram stronghold in northeastern Nigeria, raising fears of a massive advance in jihadist insurgency over a decade.
Nigeria. By (AFP) Ahmad, lanky and soft-spoken, explained how the students were cornered under a tree, divided into three groups, and led through the forest.
“We had no footwear,” she said, her feet wrapped in black socks after they became spiky.
The teenager said the group walked for hours, in the direction of neighboring Zamfara state.
“They beat us with tree branches and the flat side of their machetes,” he recalled.
But then came a stroke of luck.
He and a friend were able to hide behind a bush. They waited for absolute silence to prevail before retracing their steps back home to safety.
Devastated parents
The government has not immediately reacted to Boko Haram’s claim or confirmed its authenticity, and the number of missing students remains unclear: 320 or 333, according to two versions of officials, while the inhabitants of Kankara estimate it at more of 500.
Among the parents of missing students, many said they had long feared an attack, given the control of the region by criminal gangs.
“Our children told us that the gunmen would approach the school fence, but they never crossed the fence … until last Friday,” said Hauwa’u Isah, mother of a kidnapped child.
About 8,000 people have died in the Northwest since 2011, according to think tank International Crisis Group (ICG).
Some doubted the claim of responsibility made by Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau in an audio recording.
“It is a lie,” said Abubakar Lawan, the father of two kidnapped children.
“Abubakar Shekau is used to making such lies just to confuse people. I don’t trust that, and the situation is not what he said.”
The long wait: Parents come to school every day, desperate for news about their loved ones. By Kola Sulaimon (AFP) “Only God knows the truth,” Isah said. “All the information we have is that armed men took over the school.
Parents have been gathering at the school every day since the abduction, desperate for information on the fate of the children.
“I was about to leave last night when they brought an escaped boy here,” said Murja Goma, another mother.
“He said they had nothing to eat, that they live on acacia leaves and fruits that their captors tear from the trees for them.”
“We have shed so many tears, our hearts are heavy and we don’t even know what to do,” the woman said, appealing to the government to rescue the children.
