Provost Dismisses Report on Killing of Students 

By John Shiklam in Kaduna

The authorities of the College of Education (COE)‎ Gidan Waya, Kaduna state has dismissed reports that five of its students were killed by herdsmen in the southern part of the state. 

The college which is located in the crisis ridden part of Southern Kaduna was closed down following the crisis in the area.

A national daily and some online news sites had reported that five students of the college were killed by herdsmen. 

But addressing a news conference in Kaduna over the issue, the Provost of the college, Prof. Emmanuel Joseph Chom, dismissed the report as “false, malicious and lacking any iota of truth.”

Choms wondered why “any person or group of persons consciously or unconsciously ‎will want to destroy government’s determined effort at ensuring that normalcy return to the area with such unsubstantiated report.”

The Provost called on media professionals to always crosscheck their facts, especially, on issues that had to do with security before publishing such information to avoid compounding the security situation and scaring investors.

“I want to strongly, unequivocally and without any iota of doubt, fear or favour say that there was no student of College of Education, Gidan Waya that was killed as reported by a national daily and some online and social media, nothing of such happened.

“The report has caused so much fear in the minds of parents who have continued to call to authenticate the veracity of such report.

“The present situation in the state particularly where the school is located is very fragile and that is why we have to use the media to tell all concerned that there was no attack on any student of the school.

“Beside, the school among other schools within the area has been closed since November last year (2016) and at the moment, we don’t have the department of Mass Communication education as the students allegedly killed ‎as reported were said to have come from that department of the college.

“The only time a student of the school was killed was when the student who was on errand for his father took a wrong route and ran into the hands of Fulani Herdsmen and was killed, my security guard prior to the closure of the school was also killed, but these killings were last year and not recently as reported” Choms said.

He disclosed that ‎necessary steps were being taken to reopen the college as normalcy was gradually returning to the area.

He added that the college’s internal security measures had been beefed up with a lot of men of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) who were on and armed police men on ground to compliment government security me‎asures already put in place. 

The  College of Nursing, Kaduna State University (KASU) and the College of Education Gidan Waya all in Jema’a local government area in Southern Kaduna ‎Senatorial district of Kaduna State were  closed down over security challenges.