On July 17, 2016, 15 men stormed two
poultry farms located at Egan, Itoki area of Ikorodu, Lagos. They went
with three AK47 and rifles, one pump-action rifle, nine magazines and
270 rounds of live ammunition.
As soon as the men, who arrived the area
in three boats got to the farms, they grabbed the owners, – Alhaji
Oyebanji Wasiu and Alhaji Isiaka Owolabi along with the manager of the
two farms, 43-year-old Abiodun Adeniyi.
But this was no ordinary kidnap for ransom.
When three suspects in the case, who are
now in police custody, narrated the event that led to the kidnapping,
it became clear that there was a deep-seated vengeance involved.
The kidnappers’ inside man, 24-year-old
Idowu Dauwujoh, who is also one of the suspects in custody, told our
correspondent that when he got a job as a worker on the farms, he was
employed along with three other friends, Kekeminiwei, Afro and Odesebra,
all Ijaw young men.
Dauwujoh, who is also an Ijaw man, said few months after they were employed, Kekeminiwei, Afro and Odesebra were sacked.
He said, “The allegations were that they
were stealing from the farms. Then, Afro was dating a lady who also
worked on the farms. It became an issue between him and the manager of
the farms (Adeniyi) and the man told him to leave.
“I was the only one remaining in the
farms, but I was always in touch with the other boys. One day, they
called me and said anytime the owners of the farms were around, I should
let them know. They told me they were planning to kidnap them and that I
should act as if I knew nothing.”
Kunle Falayi of Punch Newspaper reports that, Few days before July 17, 2016, Dauwujoh, called his friends to inform them that his bosses would be around in a few days.
As soon as the owners (Wasiu and
Owolabi) arrived their farms on Wednesday, July 17, Dauwujoh gave his
friends the signal and they moved in.
Dauwujoh said when they kidnapped his
bosses including the manager, he had no idea where they were taking them
to. But he fled the farms to Delta State.
One of the suspects in custody,
26-year-old Priye Idoro, said he took part in the kidnapping and was
actually the cook in the camp where they kept their victims.
Idoro said, “Before that day, I was not a
kidnapper. All I was doing was bursting pipelines to steal crude oil at
Igbo Olomu (a suburb of Ikorodu, Lagos, where militants sacked the
entire community recently).
“One day, one of my bosses, who employed me as a pipeline vandal, informed me of the kidnap plan and I willingly went along.
“We arrived at the area before the
kidnapping day and stayed in the forest for three days. As soon as we
got the signal, we moved in and took the men.”
Saturday PUNCH learnt that the victims were taken deep into the creek where they were instructed to contact their families.
Their families later put together the
sum of N22m as ransom which they dropped in a particular location as
instructed by the kidnappers.
Idoro said, “The first day we brought
the men to the creek, I was told to go and buy foodstuff by nightfall. I
bought fish, soup ingredients and garri.
“I was feeding them eba most of the
time. Cooking was all I was doing, my bosses were the ones doing the
negotiation. When the ransom was paid, they told me it was N20m. They
brought the money in a carton and two ‘Ghana-Must-Go’ bags.
“They gave me N500,000. I treated the
men well. Before they released them, they were even praying for me that I
would do something great with the money I got.
“One evening, I went to buy food and
when I got back, they had released them. I asked about the manager too
and one of the men said he had killed him because he was the one who
sent him away from the farm, where he was working before. They did not
tell me what they did with his body.”
The group dispersed and Idoro travelled
to Sapele, Delta State, where he bought a boat with his own share. He
said he wanted to use the boat for water transport.
He would later be arrested at Sapele.
The police tracked down Idoro and the
other two suspects, after the murdered manager’s phone was tracked by
the police and located at Delta State.
One of the kidnappers had given the
phone as a gift to his brother, 27-year-old Daniel Jekene, who quickly
helped in getting the other two arrested after the police nabbed him.
When Dauwujoh was arrested, it was
learnt that the gang had given his N2.5m share to his elder brother to
give to him. But the elder brother absconded with the money.
The Lagos State Commissioner of Police,
Mr. Fatai Owoseni, said investigation was still ongoing to arrest other
members of the gang.
He said the suspects would be charged to court as soon as investigations were complete.