Suleja residents lament incessant kidnappings

Residents of Angwan Gwari Kwamba in Suleja LGA of Niger State have decried incessant abductions.

They said four residents of the area had been abducted in the past three weeks with different sums for ransom paid for their freedom.

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Some of them who spoke to City & Crime on Monday said among the victims was a father of three, Johnson James.

According to them, other victims are a Dubai-based engineer, Dafet Ehilebo, and his younger brother, Samson Ehilebo; noting that the most recent victim, a cement dealer in the area, Badejo Adekunle.

One of the victims, Adekunle, told our reporter that his abductors were five in number and that they wielded A-K47 rifles.

Adekunle, who spoke through a WhatsApp voice call, said he was released on Sunday after N3m was paid to his abductors.  

He further said, “Someone I met in the kidnappers’ den who understood Hausa and Fulani languages told me that the abductors were from Niger.”

He lamented that no security or government official at the local government level had cared to ask them what transpired.

A resident, Musa Hassan, said, “The issue of kidnapping and banditry is a serious challenge to us here. I escaped narrowly when they once came after me. Our people are not safe. We are having sleepless nights and live in perpetual fear.”

He, therefore, called on the government to intensify effort towards tackling the menace.