For 25-year-old Abdullahi Babatunde, an Ilorin, Kwara State indigene, bad friendship, as well as quest to get money to buy drugs for his ailing father, forced him to become a kidnapper.
Babatunde is one of four suspects arrested by the Kwara State Police command after they allegedly kidnapped a Fulani chief, Aliyu Harande, while he was praying in a mosque behind his house at Omu-Aran in Irepodun Local Government Area of the state.
The command’s Public Relations Officer, Mr. Ajayi Okesanmi, identified the other suspects as Musa Kadir (25), IsahSalihu (20), Suleiman Abubakar and Abdullahi Babatunde all of Rore village of Kwara State.
Amidst intermittent sobs, Babatunde who only completed secondary school from Government Secondary School, Omu-Ara, told a Punch correspondent that he had gone to his friend, Abubakar, for financial assistance, so that he could buy prescription drugs for his father, who just had an operation.
“They prescribed some medicines for me to buy for my father who had been operated upon.The cost of the medicine was too much for me to buy. So I asked Abubakar to loan me some money.
“He told me to come to his house in Omu-Aran. I went to his house on July 9. While discussing how he was going to assist me at his house, one of his friends, drove down to where we were and they started discussing in their Fulfude language which I did not understand.
“After their conversation, Abubakar told me that they were going to a hotel near his house and that they wanted to take beer there. I told him that I would not drink beer because I was fasting. He said I should follow them to the place so that we could discuss my problem further.
Babatunde said that he accepted and followed his friend.
He claimed that he sat down in the vehicle while they were discussing in Fulfude again. According to him, after a while, Abubakar and his friends left him and went into a compound.
He said not long after, he started hearing struggling sounds as if there was a fight going on in the house. He said he later heard a gunshot.
“I wanted to run away but there was no way for me to run because the place had turned riotous. I was in the vehicle when they were shooting.
“I was shocked and afraid. I wanted to rush out of the car but there was no way. After the incident, all of them rushed back to the car. They put someone inside the boot and drove away from that place.”
“A day after, they gave me N50,000 as an assistance which I requested from them.”
Okesanmi said the suspects were arrested by the command’s anti-kidnapping team after it got the report of the kidnap. He said the suspects had all confessed to the crime.
He added that the police recovered a Toyota Camry, one locally manufactured single barrel gun, four live cartridges and two expended cartridges from the suspects.
The police spokesperson said the case was still under investigation, adding that the police had intensified efforts to arrest the leader of the syndicate, who is still at large.
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