Former Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has strongly condemned the abduction of candidates of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB, in Benue State.
In a post on his verified X handle on Friday, Obi said any nation that abandons its youth abandons its future, stressing that such insecurity must not continue.
According to him, the news of the abduction of innocent UTME candidates in Benue State is not just heartbreaking but a damning indictment of the failure of leadership and the collapse of security in our nation.
The former Anambra governor lamented that young Nigerians striving for an education are being met with terror.
He added that in a country where the share of tertiary graduates is already painfully low (about 1%) which is far below peers like Indonesia (about 13%) and South Africa (around 10%), such an incident is unacceptable.
“We cannot afford to lose even one more student to violence. A nation that abandons its youth abandons its future.
“Those entrusted with protecting these young students appear increasingly preoccupied with the next election, projecting strength and power to rig elections, rather than deploying that same power and agencies to secure our roads, prevent these crimes, and rescue the abducted children who should not be in the hands of criminals but in examination halls.
“This is no longer an isolated tragedy. It is a pattern. It is a national crisis. And it demands urgent, decisive, and responsible action, not excuses, not silence, but leadership that matches the scale of the emergency this deserves,” he wrote.
