Molly Kilete and Aidoghie Paulinus, Abuja

People suspected to be security operatives, yesterday, arrested Buba Galadima in Abuja.

Galadima, a former national secretary of the defunct Congress for Progressives Change (CPC), has been a vocal critic of President Muhammadu Buhari.

He led members of the Reformed All Progressives Congress (R-APC) to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), where he was named spokesman to the Alhaji Atiku Abubakar Campaign Organisation.

His arrest came after the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council called for his immediate arrest over plans to release fake presidential election results ahead of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

Speaking with Daily Sun, a family source said Galadima was whisked away after the Muslim Zuhu prayers in Abuja.

The source said Galadima was sitting outside the gate of his house at 1:15pm when a tinted Honda Civic car conveying four persons, parked besides where he sat and the occupants surveyed the environment.

“And he was like, I don’t trust these people. And then, they drove away. They went round Wuse 2, came back and parked at the other side.

“So, Baba stood up with my husband and they went to confront them and he asked them what they were doing here. They said they were just waiting for somebody.

“He spoke to them, but then, he was like, let me go back. He came back into the house. He wanted to have his bath and I think he got a call.

“So, he wanted to go somewhere and he asked one of the boys in the house to take him. As they drove out, I think on their way, they blocked them and told Baba to come down and join them in their car. We don’t know where they went with him,” the family source said.

The source, however, called for the immediate and unconditional release of the Yobe State-born politician.

The source admitted that the family was disturbed about the arrest, adding that the family was afraid that Galadima might be harmed, having earlier received threats to his life.

“If we know that he is ok, then… We know that sometimes, something may happen. Now that you don’t know, they are just killing people all over the place,” the source added.

Meanwhile, spokesman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Kola Ologbondiyan has confirmed Galadima’s abduction.

According to Ologbondiyan, armed security operatives whisked Galadima away yesterday.

The PDP spokesman, who tweeted this, did not say where and when the incident happened.

“Nigerians and the world over should know this— Alhaji Buba Galadima has just been kidnapped by masked security operatives; his whereabouts is unknown. Buhari and APC are hell bent on destroying our hard earned democracy. We will never be cowed; the will of the people must prevail,” he tweeted.

However, the Police Force Headquarters, Abuja, has said that it did not arrest Galada, the spokesman of the PDP’s presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar’s campaign organisation.

Galadima was said to have been arrested by security operatives at his residence in Abuja.

Force Public Relations Officer, Frank Mba, who made this known in an interview with Daily Sun, said Galadima, who is also a member of the Reformed APC (R-APC), a faction of the APC was not in police custody.

Mba, when asked if the politician was in the custody of the police said: “I don’t know about it.”