A heartrending video showing students abducted from the College of Agriculture and Animal Science in Zamfara State has appeared on social media platforms with the captives asking authorities to negotiate their release.
Last Sunday, 15 students and four staff were abducted from the college, located in Bakura Local Government Area of the state.
The video showed the students, including three females, flanked by six armed men.
“Assalamu Alaikum, we are the students kidnapped from College of Agriculture and Animal Science. Our captors are threatening to kill us if a ransom is not paid within 24 hours,” one of the students said in the video.
“They took us to where they dumped the corpses of those they killed after they were kidnapped from Yarkufoji community. They told us that similar fate is waiting for us if their demand is not met in time,” he added.
A staffer of the college, who preferred not to be named, confirmed to Daily Trust that those in the video were the abducted students of the college.
He said the armed criminals had demanded N350 million as ransom to release them.
“The student is talking about those the armed criminals had killed and dumped their corpses. This could be true because the residents they killed might be the ones abducted from the Yarkufoji community last week.
“The armed men had earlier raided the community and abducted about 20 residents. Some of the kidnapped victims were released after a ransom was paid.
“But they might have killed some of them whose families could not raise ransom or were struggling to meet the deadline they set for the delivery of money,” he said.
Governor Bello Mohammed Matawalle has assured that he would do everything humanly possible to ensure that the abducted students regain freedom.
