Nigerian man has a lucky escape during kidnap bid

Kaduna is one of the northwestern Nigerian States where heavily armed criminal gangs target villages and communities to raid, loot and carry out mass abductions for ransom.

Waking up to a gunman shining a light around his house, Nigerian Yusuf Thomas took his chance to escape when his would-be kidnapper told him to lie still and walked away to make a call.

He was lucky. More than 80 residents from his village in northwest Nigeria’s Kaduna State were snatched after gunmen marched them out of their homes on Sunday evening in the country’s most recent mass abduction for ransom.

The raid on the village in Kajuru district came just weeks after around 280 pupils were abducted from a school by a criminal gang in the same State, prompting a national outcry about Nigeria’s insecurity.

Mr. Thomas thought he would be shot until he managed to escape. “I heard a voice telling me not to raise my head or I’d be shot, so I laid down,” he said.

“When he turned back and was making a call to his colleagues, I used the opportunity to escape.”

Kaduna is one of the northwestern Nigerian States where heavily armed criminal gangs target villages and communities to raid, loot and carry out mass abductions for ransom.

State officials have not given any figures for the kidnapping, but local officials say 87 people, mostly women and children, were taken.