They Demanded N50 Million, I Ended Up Paying N6m For His Release

“Later, we started begging them to take N500,000. But they said no and started scaring us.

“Three days ago, they called and said we should pay N15 million. We kept begging them that all we had was N5.5 million.

“They said no and insisted on N6 million. So, it’s that N6 million we paid.”

Those were the words of a mother of one of the freed members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) abducted by kidnappers on October 1.

Gunmen had attacked two 18-seater buses conveying them from Ibadan, along the Owerri-Onitsha expressway.

The woman speaking to News Central, said the abductors had asked parents of the victims to send representatives to meet them in Ibadan as part of arrangements for the ransom payment.

“They called all the parents of all the victims.

“Twenty of them are in the bush. They then asked us to send three persons each to meet with them in Ibadan. My husband and my son’s elder brother went.

“When they got to the meeting place, they asked them to send the money to an account and that when they got to Imo state, they should change the money into dollars.”

“It is not rumours. They have all been released and sent to us. His brother is among the people who went to meet with the abductors three days ago. They left with the ransom.

“It was the brother who called us this evening to say that they had handed the ransom to the kidnappers and that they had released our son. We also spoke to the boy.”

“Since he was kidnapped, I have been stooling. I couldn’t sleep either. But I was relieved when I heard they had been released. It was as though the chains all over me were loosened,” she said.

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