Eleven people, including a member of the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) personnel, were abducted after gunmen stopped a Benue Links vehicle traveling from Onitsha, Anambra State to Makurdi.
On Sunday, September 17, 2023, around 2:30 pm, an event occurred on the Otukpo-Enugu expressway along the Olanyega/Ogbodo route in the Okpokwu Local Government Area of Benue State.
Four more passengers, out of the eleven now being held prisoner, reportedly managed to escape.
The NTA employee, Mr. Thomas Tikyaa, an accountant who had reportedly been transferred from the Makurdi Zonal Network Office to Abia state and was traveling to Benue to see his family at the time of the occurrence, was identified as Mr. Tikyaa.
The Zonal Director, Pam Dung Nyam, sent a letter of complaint to the Benue State Command Commissioner of Police pleading for immediate action to save the victims.
"I wish to formally report the kidnapping of an NTA Staff, who was recently redeployed from NTA Network Centre, Makurdi, to NTA, Abia State," Nyam said.
On September 17, 2023, at around 10:00 p.m., a deplorable occurrence took place between Ogbokolo and Otukpa as a passenger on a Benue Links bus traveling to Makurdi to visit his family.
Mr. Nyam said that if the victim is saved and brought back to his family safely, the NTA family will be pleased.
An NTA employee who wished to remain anonymous told newsmen that Tikyaa's family had been approached by the kidnappers, who had initially sought a N50 million ransom before lowering their demands to N10 million.
The state police command's spokesperson, SP Sewuese Anene, acknowledged the kidnapping but did not disclose how many victims were in the car because the inquiry is still ongoing to identify those guilty.
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