Abducted policemen’s wives, 8 others rescued in Rivers

Two police officers’ wives and eight others abducted along the Port Harcourt /Owerri Road by bandits have been rescued by detectives from the Inspector-General of Police Monitoring Unit in Rivers State.

They were abducted few days while returning from Onitsha.

The commander of the unit, Benneth Igwe, told journalists yesterday that it took him and his men three days inside the forest to rescue the kidnapped victims. ago

He said the victims were at first taken to the Navy War College in Ubima where they took shelter and received medical before being moved to the monitoring unit at Aluu where they were reunited with their families.

Some of them told newsmen that they were brutalized; and their belongings seized by the abductors who threatened to kill them if they refused to call their relatives for ransom.

The driver of the vehicle in which they were travelling before they were abudcted, Uzuoma Iwuala, said some relatives paid ransom.

One of the rescued victims, who pleaded anonymity, said that the bandits collected their ATM cards and used same to withdraw huge cash from their bank accounts.

In a related development, soldiers deployed to the Elele-Omurelu-Owerri Road have rescued six people who were travelling out of Port Harcourt.

One of the soldiers told newsmen that the suspected kidnappers ambushed travellers around the Akpani axis of Port Harcourt-Owerri Road and diverted them to a forest before security’s intervention.