A security guard with the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria, Aliyu Abubakar, has been arrested by the Nigerian Police Force for providing logistical and intelligence support to kidnappers who have been terrorising the university.
According to police spokesman, Frank Mba, Abubakar was arrested by the Special Tactical Squad of the Inspector-General of Police for ‘providing’ assistance to the kidnappers who have on various occasions terrorised the institution.
Mba made the disclosure while parading about 25 suspects accused of committing various offences.
He also said that among those arrested was the ‘spiritual consultant’ of the kidnappers terrorising ABU, Malam Jafaru. According to Mba, Jafaru provides spiritual guidance to the kidnappers.
Daily Trust in its report, says the arrest comes in the wake of a spate of kidnappings that have hit the university campus and its environs, with staff and students taken for ransom.
The newspaper said in November, gunmen forcefully abducted a staff of Ahmadu Bello University and released his wife and daughter after a gunfight with police.
It explained that the kidnappers had invaded the home of the staff on university’s main campus in Zaria and took him, his wife and daughter. The campus security passed on a distress call to the police intelligence response team who engaged the kidnappers in a gunfight. He was released later in December.
The report added that in December, nine students of the school’s French Department were abducted while on a trip to Lagos for an academic programme. Their abductors later demanded N270 million as ransom.
