Eleven people, including several members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), have been rescued after armed men abducted passengers along the Aloma-Egane Expressway in Ofu Local Government Area of Kogi State.
The victims were travelling from the NYSC orientation camp in Kolokuma/Opokuma Local Government Area of Bayelsa State towards Abuja when the attackers struck on Wednesday.
The Kogi State Police Command said the incident occurred at about 4:40pm around Ogene Zaria, close to the Ogene Zaria/Onicha-Igo Junction.
According to the police, the attackers emerged from the bush, blocked two buses travelling in opposite directions and abducted some of the passengers, while others fled into the surrounding bush.
The command said the Divisional Police Officer in Ofu led a joint team of security operatives to the scene after receiving a distress call.
Two abandoned vehicles, including a Peace Mass Transit white Hummer bus and a yellow 18-seater bus, were recovered at the scene.
The police subsequently launched a bush-combing and rescue operation which resulted in the recovery of 11 abducted victims, including the drivers of the two buses.
The command’s spokesperson, Saliu Afusat, said preliminary debriefing showed that most of those rescued were NYSC members travelling from Bayelsa State to Abuja.
She said the rescued victims were debriefed and, after the necessary procedures, were allowed to continue their journey.
The police, however, said the operation was continuing as efforts were being intensified to locate and rescue other victims who remained in the hands of the abductors.
The command said available operational and intelligence resources had been deployed towards securing the release of the remaining victims.
Meanwhile, relatives of some of the abducted corps members have taken to social media to appeal for assistance, with claims that the kidnappers demanded N20 million as ransom.
The ransom claim had not been independently verified as of the time of filing this report.
The incident has renewed concerns over the safety of corps members travelling between orientation camps and their destinations, particularly on highways where criminal gangs have continued to target travellers.
