With victims of kidnap, mum has always been the word, as they seem to always come out scared stiff to relay their experience. However, a clergyman, who spent six whole weeks in the kidnappers’ den in this rare encounter with Gboyega Alaka tells his story. It is one of horror.
They tied both my hands tight with rubber wire and beat me mercilessly, asking, ‘Where is the N3million in your account? Where is the N3million transferred into your account? ‘When I told them the money was no longer with me and that I had transferred it to the owners, five hefty men started beating me with whip. When I insisted, they said, ‘You don’t want to talk, ko? Don’t worry, this is appetiser, we’re coming again tomorrow.’
“True to their words, they came back the following day and repeated the same thing. They beat me mercilessly. This was with both my hands still tied. They told me ‘We’d just kill you.’ I told them, even if you kill me, you cannot get the money from me because it is not with me. I also told them, if you kill me, that is the way God wants it. By this time, the beating had got to a level where I was beyond caring. I was in serious pains but they didn’t care. And to them, crying means nothing. In fact, they’d tell you, ‘You want to cry? No problem, cry on.’ Meanwhile, my hands remained tied and I was in serious pain.”
The above is sneak peek of what John Chukwu (not real name), a devout Christian, went through at the hands of kidnappers who abducted and kept him in very deplorable condition until providence intervened and he was released.
According to Chukwu, he was abducted in broad daylight in his farm house near Sarkin Pawa along Kaduna road by gunmen, who had initially visited his house and on learning he wasn’t at home, forced his wife to lead them to where he was.
“It happened on December 14, 2021. When they got to where I was, they broke into the house and asked for Pastor Chukwu. The moment they identified me, they seized me at gunpoint. They also called out another man and a woman. There and then, they asked, ‘Where is the three million naira in your account?’ I told them I didn’t have the money, so they tied my hands and took us deep inside the bush. We left around twelve noon and got to their camp at about the time they were calling for Muslim 4 o’clock prayer. That makes it about four/five hours trek. They had seized my phone, so I had no idea of time.”
In their camp, Chukwu said the kidnappers were ruthless. Aside the beating, his complaint that his tied hands were paining him fell on deaf ears. In truth, Chukwu said the exact amount of money they mentioned was transferred into his account but he had immediately disbursed it into the accounts of the owners. It was payment for soya beans which they had delivered to a company, for which the company usually transferred payment into his account for onward disbursement to the different farmers or traders.
“I never allowed money sleep in my house, and it was because of things like this,” he said.
Fortunately, Chukwu said he found favour in the eyes the kidnappers’ boss, who after forty-eight hours of torture, ordered that they loosen him. At this point, however, he said his hands were gone.
“Because they had been tied awkwardly for two whole days, which prevented flow of blood, into them, the hands became like logs, heavy and useless. I couldn’t pick anything; I couldn’t use them for anything; even to eat, somebody else, usually another kidnapped victim, had to feed me.”
Somehow, he said he kept praying, and it seemed God worked ahead of him and he found favour in the eyes of the kidnappers’ boss, as he never allowed them tie him or beat him again. Sometimes, he’d even ask him, ‘Pastor, have you eaten?’ And if he answered ‘no’, he would ask them to take from his portion and give to him.
Aside those occasions, however, he said victims only got fed pap in the morning, and afterwards, water in the afternoon and night.
“But if they had begun negotiating with your people and it was clear that good money was coming, they would move you to a separate location where you were entitled to two or three meals a day. They see you as a promising or profitable venture. I fell into the pap category because they were not able to reach my people. By the time we got to their camp, my phone battery had run out; and because there were several other phones of the same make as mine, all dead, they couldn’t locate which belonged to me and gave up after several efforts. That, in a way, was another of God’s favour, because if they had been able to reach my family, they would have demanded some huge sums, which I was sure my family would not have been able to raise. Right there, I heard them telling other victims’ families to bring huge unimaginable sums.”
Conversely, Chukwu said not being able to reach his family also had its disadvantage, which was grave.
“On some occasions, they would just come, pick some people and say, ‘Carry these ones, they are not productive; they’ve been here for months, go and waste them.’ And soon after, you would hear gunshots tatata…”
Asked if he could recall how many people were so eliminated, Chukwu said ‘Not really. About three or four’. Besides, he said counting the number of those eliminated wasn’t his pre-occupation at that critical time but praying in his heart for deliverance. Thrice they put me with those to be eliminated and thrice their boss stopped them, asking: ‘Who told you to put pastor among them?’
“At a point, I wondered if they had any humanity in them. Already, we were used to seeing them any time they came to attack villages around us, but it was when I got to their camp that I got to know the kind of human being they really were.”
Rape
Were there women among the captives? Were they abused?
“Sometimes, they would come and pick the young pretty ones and tell them, ‘You, get up, oga wants to talk to you. So they’d take them into a hut and by the time they came out, you would know they had been abused. Sometimes, three, four or five men would go into the hut to meet them. And it’s not a place where you can shout or get any help. So they just took it in their stride and never said anything.”
Shuwa Arabs and Nigerian Fulani
Asked what manner of persons the kidnappers were, Chukwu, said “They were predominantly Fulani. The people I saw were Shuwa Arab Fulani with long hair, possibly from Niger, Chad or Mali. Even their Fulani (Fulfude) was a bit different. They worked alongside Nigerian Fulani. The ones among them who covered their face were the Nigerians; and that’s because they knew you could identify them. And they were the ones who beat us and carried out eliminations.
“Anyway, I spent forty-one days in their camp. On the fortieth day, one of them said, ‘Hey come and see pastor, he is turning to white o, he is turning to bature (white man)!’ But there boss said, ‘You must be mad. Somebody is dying, you say he is turning to white man. Can’t you see he doesn’t have blood anymore?’
“And then their boss said, ‘Pastor, by God’s grace, tomorrow, you’re going home.’”
But rather than get excited, Chukwu said he became sad because that could also mean he was going to be eliminated.
“When he said that, one or two things crossed my mind: I had prayed to God for His intervention, and he had assured me that I would go home. So all I said in my heart was, ‘Let it be unto me according to your word.’
“The next day, the man was not around. Then on my 42nd day in their camp, he came and said ‘Ah pastor, you’re still here?’ Then he summoned one of the boys and said, ‘Where is his baggage?’ Someone said, ‘It’s only sickle o’, he said ‘give it to him.’ He asked, ‘Would you know road to your house from here?’ I said ‘no’. Then he appointed two of his boys to accompany me to the road. He also gave me N2,000. Meanwhile, the N900 I had when I was abducted was still with me.
“That was how I was released from the hell that was the kidnappers’ camp. You won’t believe it; even the escorts paid the bike man who conveyed me to town N500.”
At what point did he start using his hands?
“It’s going to a year, the hands are still not normal. Both hands literally withered and became thin because of lack of blood. I went to the hospital, and when the result of the x-ray came out, they said there was no fracture or dislocation but the veins were dead. I couldn’t pick or carry anything. The bandits released me on January 28, and by February 2nd, I started going for physiotherapy and massaging. So now, I can eat and bath by myself. September 2nd was eight months since I started going for treatment.”
Given up for dead
“When I arrived home, everybody already gave up hope that I was alive. They had even told my wife that I was dead, that I had been killed. In fact they had forced her into mourning even before Christmas. My wife was so lean; and when I asked her if she hadn’t been eating, she said how could she eat when she didn’t know what had become of me? Luckily, there was this other kidnapped victim who was released and whom I had given a message to deliver for me. That, I think, was what gave her renewed hope.
“Since I came back, God has been everything to me since I came back. A friend would just call and say ‘Send me your details and they’d credit my account. That is how my family has been surviving. I have five kids; imagine life without support of these good people!”
Spiritually, Chukwu said he learnt to meditate on Gods words because there was nothing else to turn to. Even though they seized his bible, which they never returned to him, he said he did a lot of meditating.
“Comforting verses were just flowing to my mind like drops of water, one after the other. Even in my dreams; I dreamt that I was released, and the shirt I wore in that dream was the same one I wore the day I was released. God told me specifically that ‘You will not die here; you will go home to meet with your family. It may be tough but you will laugh in the end. And that was why when they were eliminating people, I knew they would not touch me, but of course I kept my confession to myself.
“Psychologically, I became very sensitive to sounds. Any sound that sounded like a gun, even drumbeats, I would wake up with a start and start recalling the horrors of the kidnappers’ camp.”
Advice to the public
“One thing I want to advise is that people should be reserved about their possessions or monetary transactions. While I was in the kidnappers’ camp, I heard them asking questions like: ‘Who has money in your community?’ They would even call their informants right in our presence and be making enquiries about who just made a sales; who just made some good money and so on and so forth?
“I will also advise that any transaction done should immediately be deleted from our phones once read. In my case, I suspect it may have been somebody that collected my phone to check some app that gave me away. It may also have been in the bank, where somebody assisted me and I even gave him a tip. But I really can’t pin it down on anyone. And I’m sure it was not anyone from the company that paid the money into my account.
“Also I want to advise that people should avoid entertaining strangers in their homes, because there were people in that camp who became victims because they entertained visitors, who in turn told informed the bandits their worth. Business people should stop discussing their business or business dealings in the open or in the presence of strangers. These kidnappers have informants who tell them this man or that man just sold his yam and he has lots of money. And they reward the informants handsomely. Imagine giving somebody who has no job N300,000. That one would just be spending money lavishly, knowing that all he needs to do to make more money was to finger another innocent hardworking person. Anytime you see them attack any house or come for anyone, know that it is the work of informants, and they live among us.”