By Kayode Sanni-Arewa
About 30 travellers, including some students of the Federal Polytechnic, Nasarawa were reportedly abducted by suspected kidnappers along the Abuja-Nasarawa Highway on Friday.
PUNCH Metro gathered from a source who pleaded anonymity due to the nature of the incident on Sunday that the kidnappers laid siege to the vehicles conveying the travellers and abducted them into a nearby bush in the Uke area of Nasarawa State.
The source stated further that a student of the Federal Polytechnic, Nasarawa was travelling to her family in Abuja.
Our correspondent further gathered that a driver of one of the buses who escaped the attack called the attention of the police in the area to the incident.
The source said, “Thirty persons were kidnapped between Nasarawa and Abuja on Friday. The passengers were abducted from two buses and taken into the bush around a place called Uke in Nasarawa State.
“One of the passengers abducted in the incidents is an HND student of the Federal Polytechnic, Nasarawa, in Nasarawa State, who was returning to Abuja to meet her family.
“One of the bus drivers escaped from the incident. When he returned to the vehicle, he picked up some items, including the phone of one of the kidnapped victims, and reported the incident to the police station in Uke.”
When contacted for a reaction on Sunday, the Nasarawa Police Public Relations Officer, Rahman Nansel, confirmed the incident in a telephone conversation with our correspondent, stressing that three victims had been rescued while a search and rescue operation was ongoing.
He, however, said the abducted persons were not up to 30 as claimed but did not confirm the number of the victims.
“The number (30) was exaggerated. An 18-seater bus was recovered at the scene and three people were rescued. A search and rescue operation is still ongoing,” Nansel told our correspondent.
In October 2023 there was an invasion of a community in the Keffi Local Government Area by gunmen where four students of the state’s university were kidnapped and taken to an unknown destination.
Confirming the incident, Nansel explained that the abduction of the students occurred in the early hours at Angwan Ka’are area of the LGA.
(Text, excluding headline: The PUNCH)