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A Nigerian Air Force personnel, Daniel Dominic, has narrated how armed men invaded his residence in Rimi Village, Kaduna State, abducting two of his children and briefly taking his wife captive during a night raid.

Dominic said the incident occurred between 10pm and 11pm on Sunday after he had left home for work, where he was scheduled for a night shift.

According to him, his wife first called to alert him that suspected kidnappers had entered their neighbourhood, but she did not initially realise that the attackers had already broken into a neighbour’s compound and were moving towards their residence.

He said the attackers, numbering more than 10 and armed with rifles and machetes, first abducted a neighbour, identified as a laboratory scientist working at the General Hospital, Sabon Tasha, Kaduna.

The victim, according to Dominic, is the brother-in-law of Gurara TV Chief Executive Officer, Comrade Ernest Thyek Maidawa.

The Air Force personnel said the attackers subsequently broke through his fence and gained entry into his house through a window after dismantling the burglary protection.

Narrating the incident, Dominic said his wife hid their three children—Derick, Damina and Dominion—in a kitchen cabinet before the gunmen entered the house.

“My wife hid the children in my kitchen cabinet. They are three children – Derick, Damina, while the third one is Dominion,” he said.

He said his wife attempted to deceive the attackers by presenting herself as the only person in the house.

“When they came in, they now asked her, ‘Where is the money? Where is the money in this house?’ She said there was no money. They then asked her about her husband and she told them that her husband had gone to work.

“They asked her about the children and she said the children had gone for holiday to their uncle’s place. She was just lying to them, trying to distract them.”

Dominic said the gunmen, however, became suspicious and took his wife outside, where they had already tied his kidnapped neighbour.

He said the attackers later returned to search the house and discovered the three children hiding inside the kitchen cabinet.

According to him, Derick is 13 years old and would turn 14 in December, Damina is 11 and would turn 12 on Saturday, while Dominion is seven years old.

“They now took the first one and the second one and went to where my wife was,” he said.

Dominic said the gunmen accused his wife of lying to them after discovering the children, before forcing her and the two older children to move with them into nearby farmlands.

He said the attackers used tall crops in the area as cover while moving towards the bush.

However, Dominic said his wife, who was reportedly struggling to keep up with the attackers, eventually fell repeatedly along the route.

“After they had trekked many miles, my wife was not feeling too well. She was just falling down on the road. So, maybe they felt that this one was going to slow us, so they asked her to go back,” he said.

According to him, the kidnappers instructed his wife to return home and tell him to begin raising money, after telling her that they knew he was a soldier and considered him a “big man” at his workplace.

He said he arrived home shortly after the attackers had left, initially unaware that his children had been abducted

“I saw my gate locked, I saw the hole. My thinking was maybe they tried to come into the fence and enter the house, maybe they heard some noise and left,” he said.

Dominic said his suspicion changed after he inspected his neighbour’s compound and discovered that the gate was open and a large hole had been created in the fence.

He subsequently went towards the rear of his house and called out to his wife, but received no response.

He said his seven-year-old son, Dominion, who had been left behind by the attackers, eventually opened the gate.

“The next thing he told me was, ‘Daddy, they’ve carried Mummy, Derick and Damina. They kidnapped Mummy, Derick and Damina,’” Dominic recounted.

He said his wife later returned and confirmed that the two children had been taken into the bush.

The family subsequently spent the night at his mother’s residence before returning home the following morning, according to him.

Dominic said the kidnappers later contacted him around 9am this Monday morning using his wife’s mobile phone, which they seized from her.

He said he immediately recognised that the callers were the same men who had abducted his children.

“When I saw it, I knew that they were the ones,” he said.

The father said he asked to speak with his children and was allowed to do so.

“I asked them, ‘Are they beating you? Are they dragging you? Are they maltreating you guys?’ My children said no,” he said.

Dominic said the kidnappers subsequently told him that they would not kill his children and promised to contact him later.

“They said they were not going to kill my children. They said I should not worry and that later they would call me,” he said.

However, he said the abductors had not contacted him again as of the time of the interview, leaving the family uncertain about what would happen next.

Dominic said he had officially reported the incident to his superiors and that security personnel had visited the area to obtain information that could assist in locating the victims.

He appealed for urgent intervention to secure the release of his two children and ensure the safe return of his kidnapped neighbour.

The incident comes amid renewed concerns over attacks and kidnappings in vulnerable communities across Kaduna State.

SaharaReporters had earlier reported that armed bandits invaded Rimi Village in Kaduna under the cover of darkness on Sunday and abducted the brother-in-law of Gurara TV Chief Executive Officer, Comrade Ernest Thyek Maidawa.

Gurara TV had appealed to security agencies and other relevant authorities to treat the abduction as an emergency and deploy necessary resources to rescue the victims.

The station also urged residents with credible information that could assist security agencies in locating the victims or apprehending the attackers to immediately report to the appropriate authorities.

Efforts to obtain an update from the Kaduna State Police Command were unsuccessful, as its spokesperson, DSP Mansur Hassan, neither answered calls to his phone nor responded to a message sent to him.