On Wednesday April 17, four men left the Ilogbo area of Ogun State to attend a burial in the Saki area of Oyo State, but only two of them returned home alive following their abduction by a deadly gang of herdsmen on the highway. In this interview with KUNLE AKINRINADE, one of the victims, Nurudeen Olaitan Salami, who was later freed by the kidnappers, shares the heartrending encounter and narrow escape from death in the den of the kidnappers.

You were abducted by gunmen on April 17 alongside three others while returning from a burial. How did it happen?

It was an all-night final burial party of the mother of the chairman of Ilupeju Igbusi Ilogbo Community Development Association. As landlords and members of the community, I together with three others, namely Omogbolahan Olakunle, Rafiu Oriade Jolaiya and Ernest left work on that day to honour our chairman with our presence at the party.

After the party, we stayed back for a few hours on Thursday, April 18 to relax before boarding a minibus en route Lagos in the afternoon. It was a nine-passenger bus, and before it took off from the motorpark at Saki, some of our acquaintances who also came from Lagos gave us two loaves of Bokku bread and four soft drinks.

When our bus finally left the park around 3.30 pm, our expectation was a peaceful and exciting return to our base in Ogun State while savoured the bread and soft drinks our hosts gave to us. But about an hour later, the bus we boarded screeched to a halt at a checkpoint mounted by five AK-47 clutching herdsmen around the Maya axis of Lanlate-Eruwa Road.

Like a scene from a movie, the bandits dragged all the passengers out of the bus and led us into the forest, while they left two teenage Fulani passengers and the driver of the bus to continue the trip.

What then happened in the forest?
The first thing they did to us was to beat us and collect our bread and soft drinks, which they ate and drank in our presence. From there, we became the recipient of brutality and assault as they hit us constantly with sticks, and the flat ends of cutlass, and also slapped us repeatedly. They had on them a phone that looked like a satellite phone which they charged with a solar panel and used it to communicate with their contacts and family members of victims.

They didn’t want to see any iPhone at all. So the iPhones they seized from us, including mine, were all smashed on the ground and destroyed.

Apart from you and others that were seized from the bus, did you meet other victims in the forest?
Yes. Only seven of the nine passengers in our bus were kidnapped while two Fulani passengers and the driver of the bus were allowed to go. But inside the forest, we met no fewer than 11 other victims including a woman and her three young children kidnapped from their residence when the herdsmen could not get her wealthy husband, who was their target.

Among the captives was also a commercial motorcyclist otherwise called ‘okada rider’, who was abducted in Saki. He later escaped from the forest when he asked to be led to a stream to fetch water but they ran into some soldiers who opened fire and killed one of the herdsmen who led him to the stream.

How were you and other victims moved from one point to another inside the forest without running into people living in villages around the forest area?
They led us through thick forests and made detours to avoid running into villagers nearby. They were five in number but one of them was shot dead by soldiers attached to Operation Burst during an encounter the day after they led us into the forest while another member of the gang suffered a gunshot wound on his leg.

What happened was that they sent one of them to lead a victim, an okada rider, to fetch water from a stream when the soldiers who were on routine operation killed one of the herdsmen and wounded another while the victim escaped.

On the same day, at about 8 pm, they went in search of the one that suffered a gunshot wound on his leg, and that gave one of my kidnapped friends, Ernest, an opportunity to flee. That was how he escaped and contacted the police.

Ernest told us that he ran as fast as he could and that he slept in a thick forest overnight, contacted the nearby police station very early in the morning and was taken into custody.

How did you regain your freedom?
It was a narrow escape from death brought about by almighty God, who put it in the heart of the wicked herdsmen to set me free without any ransom paid. At about 7 pm on a Sunday, the leader of the gang told us that he would release us because he was expecting payment of ransom from a family whose three members were kidnapped. He however threatened to kill us if the operatives of Amotekun Corps attacked them in the forest.

Then suddenly, we heard sounds of gunshots from a distance. The shots were fired by a combined team of policemen and soldiers and the bandits returned fire too to scare the law enforcement team.

After the gunshots ceased, the leader of the gang returned to where we were kept in the forest and shot eight of their captives dead, including a 13-year-old boy. My friends, Omogbolahan Olakunle and Oriade Jolaiya, were also among the eight captives killed by the leader of the herdsmen.

One of the two siblings kidnapped was a seven-year-old boy. His 21-year-old sister and their mother were abducted from their residence. Their mother died from exhaustion in the forest while we were being led around by the bandits. They were hitting us with sticks and blows.

I was tasked with carrying the wounded member of the gang on my back. To tell you how heartless the kidnappers are, each time I got tired, he would hit me with blows on my head from the back despite the excruciating pain he suffered from his gunshot wounds. We were beaten mercilessly as we trekked in the forest.

We were released around 1.30 am on Sunday, April 21. It happened that an older brother of the two siblings abducted brought the ransom on a motorcycle for the release of his siblings and their mother who he did not know had died in the forest. The woman was left with no strength to carry on and she started seeing blood and died shortly after.

Her older son who came with the ransom had been told by the kidnappers to put his two pointer lights on when coming. They also asked him to buy rice and meat with table water when coming to drop the ransom. So, when he arrived, the kidnappers quickly collected the ransom from him and collected the motorbike which they used to escape from the scene. It was the man that took us to his family residence from where we were taken by police to their station. We walked amid downpours from the forest to the home of the kidnapped siblings where sympathizers were waiting for us.

The kidnappers cooked rice in pots and ate before us while many victims drank their urine. One of us, Fawaz, was killed by the kidnappers. Another victim called Panko, who drank his urine, died after much exhaustion.

Is it true that the kidnappers demanded N50 million ransom for your freedom?
Yes. Initially, that was the amount they threatened to collect or they would kill us. However, after pleadings and negotiations, they agreed to collect N 2.5 million.

Was the negotiation for the reduction of the ransom smooth?
No. The negotiation and pleadings for a reduction of the ransom came with brutality. When I told them that I had a bus that I had asked my family to sell and bring the money to pay as ransom, the kidnappers said the N1.5 million the bus was to be sold was an insult to them, and that they could only reduce the ransom if the value of the bus was N14 million. Hence they subjected me to merciless beating, hitting me with the flat side of a cutlass for trying to raise N1.5 million ransom.

Similarly, we were beaten after Alhaji Saheed offered the kidnappers the sum of N400,000 for our freedom. At a point, I pleaded with them in Hausa language to reduce the ransom to N2.5 million and this again incurred their wrath as they further beat me mercilessly.

Did you find out if any ransom was eventually paid to the kidnappers for your release?
It was just the grace of God that I enjoyed as no ransom was paid. What happened was that ransom was to be paid and money had been mobilised for the purpose. The chairman of our landlords association. Mr Saheed, whose mother’s burial we were returning from before our abduction, was to bring the sum of N2.5 million, and he had been told by the kidnappers to take the money to a certain spot and wait for them there.

However, I quickly used the mobile phone of the man who came to drop the ransom for his siblings to contact Saheed. I told him that we had been freed and that he should not bother bringing any ransom to the kidnappers. I told Saheed to flee from the spot where he was waiting for the kidnappers because they were already on their way to the spot after collecting N2 million to free the two young siblings among us.

The ransom for the driver, Fawaz and Panko was raised by their family members and was to also be paid by Saheed whom the kidnappers mandated to collect the money and bring to them. Panko was hypertensive, so he died from the intensity of the gunshots fired by the leader of the kidnap gang when he shot other victims dead.

What happened to you after your release?
As soon as one of my aunties learned that I was freed by the kidnappers, she came to Ibadan and brought me back to Lagos. I landed in the hospital where I received treatment for days because my body was badly brutalised and I was already very sick.

Going by your experience, would you honour another invitation for an interstate party?
Never, I will not attend any party that involves travelling to another state. Instead, I would rather send money to the organiser. I don’t pray to suffer the same fate again in my life.

• Okada rider’s wife delivered of triplets after four children cries out
• Says family planning device at public health centre failed her three times

Everything around their abode typifies squalour — a windy road dotted with craters, stray dogs charging at passers-by, a junk of cars-swathed mechanic workshops and kiosks of liquor vendors with men on drinking binge. The distressed couple, Emmanuel Olawale Jacob and Muibat his wife wallow in hopelessness in their dingy room at No 14 Ola Mummy Street, Pipeline area of Aboru, Lagos.

Still struggling with raising four children as an okada (commercial motorcycle) rider, life became a nightmare for Jacob as his wife was delivered of a set of triplets on December 17 last year, turning him into a father of seven children made up of six boys and one girl.

But neither Jacob nor his wife was excited at the news of the arrival of a set of triplets because they never planned to add any more to the four they already had. They, however, suffered a disappointment as the family planning treatment Muibat underwent at a public hospital failed and she got pregnant again only to be delivered of three baby boys.

“We didn’t plan to have seven children. It was the family planning treatment I received at a public health centre in Alimosho that failed me,” Muibat said.

“It was my fourth attempt at family planning. I had done three before and they failed, but did not result in pregnancy.

“I was assured by the health centre’s doctors of the treatment’s efficacy. I was told that it would expire by the end of 2024. I was however shocked last year when I became pregnant and was delivered of a set of triplets in December 2023.”

Muibat is a street sweeper attached to the Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA). She used to sell foodstuff until she lost her capital after her husband suffered the misfortune of being displaced from his auto-mechanic workshop some years ago.

The birth of the triplets was not without challenges. Shortly after they were born, defraying the medical bill for their delivery became a problem. The babies and their mother were detained in the hospital for weeks until a kind-hearted man of northern extraction helped to settle the bill.

But while the couple were celebrating the gesture, they were again confronted with the shocking news that their landlord had sold the house where they lived with their children.

Muibat said: “Since I was delivered of these babies, life has not been fair to me and my husband. We didn’t expect three babies at all.

“At the hospital where I gave birth to them, we could not pay the money required for delivery.

“As a result, I was detained at the hospital until a Good Samaritan came to our rescue and cleared the bill.

“While we were still rejoicing over this, information got to us that our landlord had sold the house where we lived while the new owner had ordered that all the occupants must move out within one month.

“The small room the nine of us are sharing now is one of the storerooms in our church. It was given to us for free by our former pastor who has since sold the church building and relocated to somewhere else.

“Again, the new owner of the building has told us to leave by the end of this month (April), and we don’t know where to go to because we don’t have money to get a new accommodation.”

The 40-year-old native of Ilero community in Oyo State added that the cost of feeding the triplets named Ayobami, Ayodele and Ayoola has taken a toll on the family and she has had to find an alternative in a local cereal made purely from dry corn.

“We cannot afford the cost of processed infant food. What I have been doing now is to give them breast milk and cornmeal.

“Even at that, we can no longer afford the cost of preparing the corn meal and we need help from Nigerians with good hearts to rescue us from this hopeless situation so that we don’t lose these babies and others to hunger.”

Sharing his plight during the encounter with our reporter, Jacob, a trained auto-mechanic specialising in repairs of Japanese cars, said he was displaced from his workshops many times by officials of the state government who forcibly ejected him and others.

He explained further that he suffered a similar fate in other places where he got land to establish workshops, adding that he opted to earn a living as an okada rider after he lost his workshops and had nowhere to practice his vocation.

He said: “I didn’t start my life as an okada operator. I trained as an auto-mechanic and Japanese cars are my specialty.

“It happened that I operated from a workshop on Olowu Street in Ikeja and I was doing fairly well until state authorities enforced the regulations against the location of auto-mechanic workshops in residential areas.

“After we were forcibly ejected from the workshop, I joined hands with others to establish other workshops in about three places but we were displaced by land speculators who forcibly annexed the workshops and sold them to people who converted the places to residential apartments.

“I lost many of the clients I was servicing their cars who were patronising me at the workshops. Exasperated by my joblessness and piling bills, I decided to give okada a try to earn a living and feed my family.”

Despite his solace in okada business, Jacob could not get any enduring reprieve as he moved from one problem to another.

According to the 60-year-old indigene of Ado-Odo town in Ogun State, three motorbikes were confiscated from him by the Lagos State Taskforce on Environmental and Special Offences in quick succession.

“Having lost my workshops to the enforcement by state officials and land speculators, I took to okada riding but lost three motorbikes to the state task force who impounded them during raids on our parks at Iyana Ipaja.

“After the setback, I got two motorbikes and again lost them to robbery. One of the two motorcycles was stolen where it was parked in my house while the other one was snatched from the person I asked to operate it and deliver proceeds to me.

“The robbers that snatched the motorbike inflicted deep machete cuts on the man during the robbery operation.”

Jacob said his hope hangs in the balance as help is not coming from anywhere despite his appeals to certain public and private quarters.

“I don’t have a dime as I speak,” he said.

“Having lost my means of livelihood to robbers, I have taken a job as a driver of a school bus in a private school on a paltry salary that can barely feed me not to talk of my family of seven.

“I was so confident, based on the assurance of doctors that the family planning treatment given to my wife was efficient and that it would prevent her from becoming pregnant since we were done with having more children.

“However, it failed us, and my wife was confirmed to be pregnant shortly after she was administered with the family planning method in the early months of 2023, and she was subsequently delivered of a set of triplets in December.

“When she became pregnant, we had no money to do a pregnancy scan. Otherwise, we would have known that she was carrying triplets in her womb and possibly cried out in time for help.

“Although my younger brother assisted me with money while my wife and the babies were held at the hospital, he is currently battling sight problem and he has spent a lot on the treatment of his eyes.

“A few individuals I approached are not also forthcoming, and at the moment, the person who gave us this room, who is our former pastor, has asked us to quit this place because he has sold the building to a new owner.

“My headache now is how to get new accommodation for my family and take care of my children, especially the new babies.

“As I speak with you, the man who bought this property from our former pastor has given us till 28th of this month to vacate our small room.

“Initially, he asked us to leave by the beginning of this month, but after sending people to plead with him on our behalf, he agreed to give us concession till April 28, failing which he could forcibly eject us from this building.”

He added: “The cost of feeding the babies is too much for me. My wife who is currently battling a sight problem could have helped me a little if she was still working as a sweeper. But she stopped working when she became pregnant and has not resumed work as she has to take care of the babies.

“Every week, I spend about N5,500 on milk, which we mix with corn meal to support the exclusive breastfeeding of the babies, and the burden is quite on me to look for money to take care of my family.

“I am therefore appealing to the public to rescue me from this hopelessness through financial support to cater for these new babies and the rest as I cannot afford to watch them starve and die of hunger.”

Donations can be sent to a Zenith Bank account number: 2214525106 in the name of the father of the babies, Emmanuel Jacob. He can also be reached on his mobile phone number 08024067769.

Kayode Adesile did not prepare for the fate that befell him when he visited his new wife, Oluwaseun Omolara Olusola, on June 25, 2024 at her residence in the Powerline area of Meiran, a Lagos suburb.

Unknown to Adesile, an automobile technician, he had incurred the wrath of Esther, his wife’s 15-year-old daughter from a previous marriage, for reprimanding on an occasion she disrespected her mother.

Esther, it was said, invited hoodlums to teach her stepfather a bitter lesson for meddling in her matter. The hoodlums, who were around when Adesile was visiting Esther’s expectant mother, pounced on him while he was about to enter the house, dealt him blows and recorded the scenario with their mobile phones.

“I verbally reprimanded her recently for being rude and disrespectful to her mother, who is my wife. I didn’t know that she was upset by my action which I took in good faith.

“They had carefully plotted the assault on me, knowing that I usually visit my wife’s home three times in a week.

“It was when I came around on Wednesday, June 26, 2024 that I was accosted by Esther who beckoned on the hoodlums to beat me up.

“I was badly beaten and humiliated as they took their time to make videos of the assault.”

It was said that after Adesile was assaulted, his attackers ran to the Meiran Police Station to lie that he attacked them. By the time Adesile reported the matter at the same police station he was detained.

The police, according to sources, would later find out that he was actually the victim of the assault, contrary to the complaint made by his attackers.

“The hoodlums invited by Esther were led by one Oluwakemi a.k.a. Honour, who supervised the brutality meted out to me and even filmed the scene with his boys.

“I was severely punched and battered by the hoodlums and left helpless as there was no one to save me from them.

“Even my wife who tried to save me was slapped silly by the boys and pushed to the ground.

“The hoodlums then left for the station and lied that I had attacked them.

“The police detained me when I went there to complain about the assault.

“It was later discovered that the hoodlums had lied and that they were the aggressors in this case.

“Hence, I was released on bail on Thursday June 27.”

He further said: “I started dating my wife six years ago before her mother died, and there was no problem between us.

“Her mother had asked her to bring me home for proper introduction after she told her that we were in a relationship.

“I later went to see her mother and we had a very cordial relationship before she died two years ago.

“When her mother was sick, my wife and I took very good care of her by taking her to a hospital in Abeokuta.

“She died shortly after we brought her back to Lagos.

“My wife is currently pregnant for me. I was the one that raised money to send her to school after she finished her JSS 3.

“I did not do anything to deserve the brutality meted out to me by the hoodlums she invited in connivance with a disgruntled family member of her mother to dehumanise me and even ran to the police to further detain me when in actual fact they were the aggressors.

“I was released on bail this morning (June 27) and the leader of the hoodlums is the leader a cult group in the community.”

Speaking with our correspondent, Adesile’s wife, Oluwaseun, who is also Esther’s mother, said her daughter was being brainwashed and used by her unscrupulous family members and neighbours.

Oluwaseun said: “Esther Adekunle is a product of my former marriage. Her father humiliated me and was fond of brutalising me till we parted ways.”

She said she had struggled and weathered the storm to ensure that Esther and her two siblings got a good life and education after she parted with their father.

“There is no work that I have not done to give Esther and her siblings education. I am into cleaning services just so that I can have money to ensure that they feed well and go to school since their father abandoned them for me.”

The 36-year-old woman said that Esther had formed the habit of disrespecting and insulting her in public.

“Yet, despite all my struggle to make ends meet and raise them, Esther disrespects me in public and refused to heed my instructions.

“She would leave home without my consent and return when she wishes. She bedwets and exhibits dirty habits at home.

“It was recently when she insulted me openly that my new husband called her out and verbally reprimanded her for her misguided attitude.

“It was for that reason that she further became recalcitrant and planned with my mother’s family members and neighbours to invite the hoodlums to brutalise my husband.

“My new husband is not a gold digger. I have been dating him before my mother passed on two years ago.

“He was the one that provided the money we spent in processing admission for Esther to proceed for her Senior Secobdary education.

“Yet, he is the same person my daughter brought hoodlums to humiliate in public on June 25.

“While the boys were beating my husband, they also slapped me when i tried to stop them.

“”To my surprise, the boys came back the next day, June 26, and further assaulted me and there was no one to save me from them.

“They rushed to the police station and lied to the police that my husband attacked them. The police later detained my husband.

“The leader of the hoodlums, who is the husband of my daughter’s boss, was also detained when my husband indentified him as the leader of the gang that attacked him.

She added: “My husband was freed after the police discovered that the hoodlums were the culprits.”

In an audio recording obtained by our reporter, Esther, confronted by some persons on her complicity in the assault on her mother’s husband, accused Adesile of fondling her breasts about two months earlier.

“He (stepfather) fondled my breasts about two months ago,” Esther said.

Asked why it took her two months to avenge her purported molestation and why she did not tell her mother about it, she said: “I told my mother’s family members about it.”

Adesile and Esther’s mother however described the allegation as a tissue of lies.

“She is lying. I have never molested her. She is acting a script handed to her by the people that are guiding her to disrespect her mother and myself over my wife’s inheritance which they want to dispossess her of, ” Adesile said.

Esther’s mother also said her daughter was misguided and told to lie against her stepfather after it dawned on them that their action was criminal and could have consequences.

She said: “My daughter was told to lie that my husband recently molested her.

“The truth is that she is doing a hatchet job for some people who are planning to take over my late mother’s property at all cost.

“My husband has never molested Esther. She is being used without her knowing.”

Contacted for comments, the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of the Lagos Command, Mr. Benjamin Hundeyin, did not answer his call and also had not responded to the inquiry sent to his WhatsApp at press time.