Abducted Corps Members Share Harrowing Experience In Kidnappers’ Den

Abducted Corps Members Share Harrowing Experience In Kidnappers’ Den

Four corps members and one artisan, abducted last week along the Akure-Benin highway, have recounted how they spent four days in the kidnappers den before they were released.

The victims said their families paid N5m with other items before they were released.

Other items collected by the kidnappers were three packs of Hollandia yoghurt, two loaves of bread, one carton of Peak milk, one pack of malt, bottles of Fearless drink, one pack of cigarette and 10 packs of cooked rice and chicken and N1m each totalling N5m.

It was learnt the corps members were returning home after the three-week National Youth Service Corps Orientation camp in Enugu and Abia States.

Two persons, including the driver and a female passenger, were shot dead by the kidnappers.

One of the victims, Patience Andrew, said the kidnappers initially demanded N30m for each of them but later reduced it to N1m.

She said they were beaten and made to drink garri and dirty water once a day.

According to her: “We boarded a bus from Abia State to Onitsha but our driver was not fast enough. One of the park drivers took us to where we boarded another bus going to Akure, we got there around 2 pm but the driver did not take off immediately, so we left Onitsha park around 5 pm with nine passengers in a Sienna bus.

“We got to Ondo state around 10 pm and that was when the incident happened. They flashed a torch light on the driver and the driver said “Oga I no see you”

“They just shot him twice the moment he made that statement and the woman sitting next to him was killed. One guy too was butchered, two people died and we don’t know about the guy that was butchered because he ran away.

“Then they brought us out of the vehicle and took us inside the bush, we trekked from past 10 pm till around 7 am the following day in the bush. The kidnappers were five in number and their age range should be around 25 years. They were speaking the Hausa/Fulani language and they had one interpreter.

“They tortured us and we were only given garri and water once a day. At first, they asked for N30 million per person but as the negotiation was going they brought it down to N3m so they now asked us to bring in N1 million each.

“We slept inside the bush throughout the day, we heard the bark of a dog and the sound of a cow in the bush and we also passed through farmland when we were coming out, and we didn’t meet anybody on the road then our brothers came with what N1m.”