Kidnappers of 20 medical students demand N50 Million ransom, threaten to kill captives

The abductors of 20 medical students from the Universities of Jos and Maiduguri have issued a chilling ultimatum, demanding a ransom of N50 million and threatening to start killing the hostages if their demands are not met by Saturday.

Reports indicate that the kidnappers have allowed the students to use their phones to contact family and friends who might help raise the ransom. The students were kidnapped on Thursday while traveling to Enugu State for the annual convention of the Federation of Catholic Medical and Dental Students (FECAMDS).

Samuel Oche, President of the Benue Medical Student Association (NMA), confirmed the incident and revealed that he spoke with one of the kidnapped students on Friday.

“As of yesterday, we still had access to them. We tried to know if we could still contact them, and one of them, Boniface, confirmed to me on call that the kidnappers were asking for N50 million collectively,” Oche said on Saturday.

Also, the activity on the X account of Kingsley Aondona, one of the abducted medical students, on Friday was spotted

“We were kidnapped on our way to Enugu for a convention,” he tweeted. “They are requesting N50 million for 20 of us medical students. Please, help us and we haven’t eaten for two days. They said they would start killing us tomorrow.”

As is the case in many situations of abductions, families of the abducted mostly rely on public contributions to pay the ransom. When asked how much had been raised to pay the kidnappers, he said:

“To be honest, I have no idea if the contributions have started or not. I think this should be a national security concern, not individuals trying to contribute money.

“What I was thinking was that if we got the government to know about this, there should be a way to retrieve these people without having to pay a dime.

“How long are we going to continue to pay money?” He asked, adding that some of the victims were sharing live locations.

“Some of the abductees were chatting with us right from in there. These are some of the hints that we have that are supposed to enable security agencies to make use of to track these people and get them out for us rather than donating money,” he said.

The students were ambushed and taken by gunmen around 5:30 pm in the Otukpo area of Benue State.