Unidentified assailants in military overalls stormed the coastal city of Town-Brass in Bayelsa State on Friday Kidnapping the 60-year-old wife of a prominent chief and retired senior official of the Nigerian Agip Oil Company, Madam Walama OtikiriMadam Walama Otikiri.
The incident occurred about 11pm on Friday and created a lot of turmoil and confusion with the gunmen shooting sporadically for over 30 minutes to scare residents.
Community sources said the abduction of Madam Otikiri came a few days after an in-law to a member of the Bayelsa State House of Assembly, Israel Sunny-Goli, was released from the kidnappers’ den.
The gunmen, according to sources, entered the community by water with two speedboats and shot their way in and out of the community after the operation which lasted for about 45 minutes.
Confirming the development in a statement issued on Saturday, Sunny-Goli condemned the abduction of one of his constituents, Otikiri, by unidentified gunmen.
Sunny-Goli described the abduction as not only malicious and senseless but utterly inhumane. He, therefore, called for her immediate release.
The lawmaker said, “Kidnapping has become the greatest monster bedevilling us as a people, and it is now imperative that we sit together at a round-table (conference) to discuss how best we can bring it into extinction.
“It is against this backdrop that I wish to call on security agencies to quickly swing into action in order to rescue the innocent woman from the hand of her abductors as well as bring the perpetrators of this heinous act to justice.”
When contacted, the spokesman for the Bayelsa State Police Command, Mr. Asinim Butswat, said he was not aware of the abduction.
Butswat, however, promised to return the call after confirming from the police division in Twon-Brass. But as of the time of filing this report, he had yet to do so.