TWENTY prospective National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members and one other passenger abducted along the Owerri-Onitsha Road in Imo State have regained their freedom.
The victims regained freedom on Wednesday, October 7, following a coordinated operation involving security agencies.
A source in the State Security Services (SSS) confirmed the release to The ICIR on Wednesday, saying the abducted prospective corps members and the other victim had been rescued.
The development comes six days after the victims were abducted while travelling to NYSC orientation camps in Abia and Akwa Ibom states.
The two buses conveying the prospective corps members and other passengers were attacked at about 6:30 a.m. on Thursday, October 1, near Umunoha in the Mbaitoli Local Government Area.
The Imo State Police Command had confirmed the attack, saying it deployed tactical teams and other operational assets in collaboration with security agencies to rescue the victims and arrest the attackers.
The police initially said 10 victims were rescued at the scene and that the exact number of people abducted was still being verified.
“Following a swift response by the police and other security agencies, both buses have been recovered, and 10 victims were rescued at the scene. The rescued victims are in safe hands and are being attended to,” the Police Public Relations Officer, Henry Okoye, said in a statement on October 1.
The command added that its operatives were conducting coordinated search-and-rescue operations supported by intelligence-led tracking of the suspects. Families of the victims and subsequent media reports indicated that several prospective corps members remained in captivity.
When contacted by The ICIR on Wednesday via phone call and Whatsapp message for confirmation of the reported rescue and details of the operation, Okoye did not respond as of the time of filing this report.
The ICIR reported one of the parents of the victims appealing to President Bola Tinubu and the Inspector-General of Police, Tunji Disu, to intervene in the rescue of the abducted corps members.
The parent said her daughter, Kehinde, who was travelling to an NYSC orientation camp in Akwa Ibom, sent the word “kidnappers” to the family’s WhatsApp group shortly after the bus came under attack.
Channels Television reported that the victims are receiving medical attention at the SSS Hospital in Owerri, where NYSC Director-General, Brigadier General Olakunle Oluseye Nafiu, visited them.
He was accompanied by the Imo State Commissioner of Police, the Director of the SSS and the Commander of 34 Artillery Brigade, Imo State.
The Nation also reported that the military, SSS and police carried out an intelligence-led operation to rescue the victims.
The circumstances of the rescue and whether any of the suspected kidnappers were arrested were not immediately disclosed.
The abduction was the second reported incident involving prospective corps members on Nigerian highways in recent weeks.
In September, corps members travelling from an orientation camp were among passengers abducted along the Aloma-Egane Expressway in Kogi State.
The Kogi State Police Command later said 11 victims, including NYSC members and the drivers of two buses, were rescued while security operations continued to locate other victims.
Mustapha Usman is an investigative journalist with the International Centre for Investigative Reporting. You can easily reach him via: musman@icirnigeria.com. He tweets @UsmanMustapha_M