The judicial commission that investigated the May abduction of pupils and teachers in Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State took evidence from 72 witnesses before submitting its report to Governor Seyi Makinde on Tuesday, according to the commission’s chairman.
Justice Mojeed Owoade, a retired judge who chaired the panel, presented the report at the Executive Chamber of the Governor’s Office in Ibadan. He said the commission visited the scene of the attack, inspected the affected schools and held public hearings in Ikoyi-Ile, Ogbomoso and Ibadan.
Owoade said the witnesses ranged from victims and traditional rulers to civil society groups, experts and other stakeholders. He said the report set out recommendations aimed at strengthening preventive security, improving intelligence gathering and tightening cooperation among security agencies and government institutions.
One recommendation stood out in his account. Owoade said the commission had formed the opinion that the laws and management of forest reserves, particularly the Old Oyo National Park, needed to be reviewed. The park, which belongs to the Federal Government, is where the abductors held their captives, and he described the review as essential for security.
Receiving the report, Makinde said the recommendations would guide government decisions and the assignment of responsibilities. He said the safety of children must be the measure by which any resulting changes are judged, and that confidentiality would not be used to avoid accountability.
In a statement issued by his media adviser, Dr Sulaimon Olanrewaju, the governor said the Oriire attack had tested the security structure his administration built over the years. He said the 615 toll-free number had been approved but was not operational when he took office, and that the City Watch and Security Control Room infrastructure had been started but was partly non-functional.
According to the statement, his government put the 615 line into operation, refurbished and expanded the control room, and connected the Police, Amotekun, Operation Burst and other services through a shared communication system to coordinate the response. Makinde acknowledged, however, that the record was not one of unbroken progress.
“Some people will say that under this administration, we brought down the crime rate. But Oriire is part of the record,” he said in the statement. “No responsible government can point to earlier progress and ask families to overlook a grave failure of protection.”
Makinde said rescue alone could not be the test of success, and that the harder questions were what could have prevented the attack, what could have shortened the ordeal, and what would make schools safer. He linked those questions to what he described as his national advocacy for a security reset, arguing that Nigeria as a whole needed a working system that could be examined when it failed.
The governor also urged the Federal Government to intensify efforts to free 40 schoolchildren abducted in Borno State on the same day as the Oriire attack, who he said had remained in captivity for more than 110 days. He said no Nigerian child should have to fear for their life for trying to get an education. Makinde is the Allied People’s Movement presidential candidate.
The Speaker of the Oyo State House of Assembly, Adebo Ogundoyin, commended the panel and said the Assembly would continue to prioritise legislation and interventions to strengthen security and protect schools and communities. He said the lessons from the incident had to translate into stronger systems and concrete action to prevent a recurrence.
The commission was constituted after the 15 May attack on three schools in Oriire, namely Community Grammar School, Baptist Nursery and Primary School, and L.A. Primary School. Records of the incident put the number abducted at 39 pupils and seven teachers, including the principal, Mrs Alamu, though some early accounts placed the total higher, with the senator representing Oyo North, Abdulfatai Buhari, citing 49 persons including a toddler at the time.
The captives were held for 56 days in the Old Oyo National Park and regained their freedom on 10 July, a release the Presidency, through the spokesman Bayo Onanuga, said followed a security operation in which several suspects were arrested and others killed. Two teachers, Michael Oyedokun and Adesiyan Adegboye, did not survive the ordeal. Oyedokun, a mathematics teacher, was killed shortly after the abduction, in a case that drew national condemnation and protests by teachers.
Makinde inaugurated the commission on 31 July, weeks after the release, with a mandate to establish how the attack happened, what information was available, how institutions responded and what should change. With the report now submitted, attention turns to which of its recommendations the government adopts, particularly the proposed review of federal forest reserves, and whether the promised reforms follow.