Education director kidnapped, N40m ransom demanded

Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State

A group of suspected kidnappers who abducted a director with the Kaduna State Ministry of Education, Science and Technology are demanding for N40 million ransom, an official in the ministry has said.

The victim, Mr John Gorah, was abducted at midnight on Sunday at his residence located in Mararaban Rido, Kaduna.

The Deputy Director, Higher Education in the ministry, Mr Steven Haruna, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kaduna on Tuesday that the kidnappers had contacted the victim’s family.

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Haruna explained that the kidnappers stormed the victim’s house, fired multiple gunshots in the air to scare people and pulled down a section of the fence before taking Gorah away.

He also said that the kidnappers abducted a nursing mother in the neighbourhood, leaving her three weeks old baby behind.

“The kidnappers have called the family and demanded for N40 million ransom,” he told NAN.

Kidnapping in Nigeria got international attention when 276 female students were kidnapped from the Government Secondary School in the town of Chibok in Borno State, Nigeria.

Responsibility for the kidnappings was claimed by Boko Haram, an extremist, Islamic, terrorist organization based in northeastern Nigeria.

Fifty seven of the schoolgirls managed to escape over the next few months[4] and some have described their capture in appearances at international human rights conferences.

A child born to one of the girls and believed by medical personnel to be about 20 months old also was released, according to the Nigerian president’s office.

Since then hopes were raised on various occasions that the 219 remaining girls might be released.

Newspaper reports suggested that Boko Haram was hoping to use the girls as a negotiating pawns in exchange for some of their commanders in jail.