Kidnappers relocate abducted Epe students from Lagos creeks

The kidnappers had given parents of the abducted students Tuesday last week as deadline for payment of N20 million as ransom for the release of each of the students, threatening to relocate them if their demand was not meant.

• We have been abandoned, parents cry out

The six Senior Secondary School students of Lagos Model College, Igbonla, who were abducted in Epe, nearly two weeks ago, have been relocated to another camp outside Lagos and Ogun creeks.

The kidnappers had given parents of the abducted students Tuesday last week as deadline for payment of N20 million as ransom for the release of each of the students, threatening to relocate them if their demand was not meant.On the expiration of the deadline, three members of the gang who had gone to survey the waterways prior to the planned relocation were arrested in Benin/Edo state capital by operatives of the Inspector-General of Police Intelligence Response Team last Tuesday
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But it was gathered that the relocation of the student was done yesterday through a new route in the creeks between the border of Lagos and Ogun states. 
Meanwhile, 11 days after the kidnap, parents of the victims have resolved to raise funds to secure the release of their kids.

Speaking with newsmen yesterday, the parents said they decided to raise the funds after the government has allegedly abandoned them to their plight.“What we wanted to do as parents was to beg them to listen to us so we can give them whatever we could raise,” said one of the parents, who craved to be anonymous.

“But they said ‘No’, they only wanted to negotiate with the government. They said they don’t want the stipend that we could raise. “But now we have to raise the fund. We are raising whatever we can.”

While narrating their ordeals, the parents had disclosed that the kidnappers were demanding N100 million as ransom, as against the N400 million they initially asked for.

“We are retired civil servants, fishermen, and pensioners. There is absolutely no way we could raise N100 million and the government has said it was not going to negotiate with kidnappers. So, we are in confusion,” an elderly man who spoke on behalf of the parents said. The six students still with the kidnappers are Peter Jonah, Isiaq Rahmon, Adebayo George, Judah Agbausi, Pelumi Philips and Farouq Yusuf.