Desperate Nigerian parents pleaded Wednesday for an end to their "nightmare" after Boko Haram Islamists kidnapped more than 100 girls from a secondary school in the embattled northeast.

The abduction by armed insurgents from the Chibok area of Borno state late Monday came just hours after a bomb ripped through a packed bus station on the outskirts of Abuja, killing 75 people, the deadliest attack ever in the capital.

The bombing was also blamed on Boko Haram, a group whose five-year extremist uprising has shaken Africa's most populous country and top economy.

"They took away my daughter," said one woman from Chibok.

"I don't know what to do," she told AFP, urging the government to find the kidnappers. "They should not allow our daughters' dreams to be shattered by these murderers."

A father who said his daughter was taken in the attack described the ordeal as a "nightmare."

"The whole town is in mourning," he said from Chibok.

The gunmen stormed the Government Girls Secondary School after sundown on Monday, torching several buildings before opening fire on security forces guarding the school.

Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is forbidden," has repeatedly attacked schools and universities in an insurgency that has killed thousands of people since 2009.

Intensifying violence in the group's northeastern stronghold has forced school closures across the region.

It is not yet clear why the Chibok school was open, but Emmanuel Sam, an education officer based in the area said the girls had been scheduled to write exams this week and that school was full when the attackers arrived.

AFP