Nigerian police on Sunday (Jan 21) rescued five sisters who were held captive after being abducted in Abuja.
Six sisters were kidnapped by armed men at the beginning of the year who barged into their residence which was located just 15 miles (25 kilometres) from Abuja city centre, according to their family members.
The girls were rescued by the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) police and the army on Saturday night (Jan 20) in the Kajuru forest in neighbouring Kaduna State.
“The FCT Police has rescued the victims and reunited them with their families,” a police statement said.
One of the family members of the sisters confirmed their rescue to news agency AFP.
The abducters had demanded ransom for the release of the girls and when the deadline for it passed, they killed 21-year-old Nabeeha Al-Kadriyar which triggered a public outcry.
Kidnapping incidents in Nigeria
Kidnapping is one of the major issues Nigeria has been battling for a very long time with criminal gangs abducting people from highways, apartments and even kids from schools.
Gangs, that are locally dubbed as bandits, operate out of bases in forests across the northwest and central states.
After the incident triggered public outrage, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu condemned the abduction and said that the country was recently witnessing a “spate of kidnappings and bandit attacks”.
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Tackling security concerns was one of the major promises made by Tinubu since he took over office in the month of May last year.
Some experts blame the country’s current economic situation behind the rise in such incidents as desperate Nigerians get down to committing such crimes for income.
Even though paying ransom to kidnappers is barred under Nigerian law, some victim families thought they had no choice because of little to no faith in the authorities.
The kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls by Boko Haram jihadists from Chibok in northeastern Nigeria stoked global fury in the year 2014, but daily kidnappings rarely gain as much international attention.
(With inputs from agencies)
