By Ade Martins-
Kidnappers armed with assault rifles have abducted 32 people from a railway station in Nigeria’s southern Edo state, the governor’s office said.
Nigerian Police said in a statement on Sunday that armed herdsmen attacked Tom Ikimi station at 4pm (15:00 GMT) as passengers waited for a train to Warri, an oil hub in nearby Delta state.
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The station is some 111km (69 miles) northeast of state capital Benin City and close to the border with Anambra state. Some of the victims at the station were shot in the attack, police said.
Edo state information commissioner Chris Osa Nehikhare said one of the 32 people taken by the kidnappers managed to escape.
“At the moment, security personnel made up of the military and the police as well as men of the vigilante network and hunters are intensifying search and rescue operations in a reasonable radius to rescue the kidnap victims,” he said. “We are confident that the other victims will be rescued in the coming hours.”
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The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) had closed the station until further notice and the federal transport ministry called the kidnappings “utterly barbaric”.
The incident is a reflection of the growing insecurity in West Africa’s most populated country where lawlessness is rife and unemployment high.
The country is preparing for its next national elections in February.
In December, the NRC reopened a rail service linking the capital, Abuja, with northern Kaduna state, months after attackers blew up the tracks, kidnapped more than 150 passengers and killed six people.
Kidnapping has become a business for hardened thugs in the country who live from hand to mouth on a daily basis. They demand ransoms for kidnapped people.
Last June, Hon. Mike Ogiasa was kidnapped and dumped in a six feet hole dug in an unknown area and his head covered with black hood. His two hands were tied and he was pleading to his friends and families to arrange any amount in their possession for his kidnappers to release him
Insecurity is on the rise across parts of Nigeria, with Boko Haram and its ISIL (ISIS)-affiliated offshoots in the northeast, banditry in the northwest, separatists in the southeast and farmer-herdsmen clashes in the central states.
The next president of Nigeria will have the difficult task of solving the soaring problem of insecurity in Nigeria.
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