Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
Four persons, two women and two men, are currently cooling their heels in police net over the kidnap of a two-year-old baby boy, in Makurdi, the Benue State capital.
The suspects are Joy Onyabu, 30, and mother of five, Sunday Samuel, Joy’s live-in lover and father of her last child, Friday Orinya, 33, driver from Ogbadibo Local Government area and Lucy Vincent, mother of two from Konshisha.
According to Joy, who is the suspected mastermind of the kidnap, she and her friend, Lucy, connived to steal the baby on the afternoon of October 10, at the North Bank area of Makurdi.
Joy said she saw the little baby with a child of about seven years old trying to cross the road and suddenly a thought to steal him flashed through her mind and she quickly discussed wt ith her friend, Lucy, who also bought into the idea.
She narrated her experience, “After my friend and I agreed to the deal, I approached the two children, gave the older one N50 to go and buy biscuit from a nearby shop.
“As soon as the young boy left to buy the biscuits, I gave my baby to my friend, picked up the baby strapped him to my back and off we went to Yaman Park where we boarded a vehicle to Aba in Abia State.”
She said at Aba, they handed over the stolen baby to one woman called Elizabeth who gave them N250,000 as payment for the ‘commodity’.
Joy, who was currently breastfeeding a four-month- old baby, blamed the devil for her action, saying one woman from Enugu State introduced her to the ‘trade’ some years back.
She added that she did not know what actually pushed her into the business.
Corroborating Joy’s claim, her friend, Lucy, a mother of three, claimed it was the first time she was involved in such act and said she could not bear it when they returned from Aba and news about the missing child was everywhere in the area.
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In the words of Lucy, “When I heard about the news of the missing baby, my conscience couldn’t allow me.
“So, I confided in them that I knew where the baby was and that I was ready to take them there provided they did not involve the police.
“They promised me that they wouldn’t involve the police but I was surprised when they brought the police into the matter,” she said.
She also disclosed that she only got N50,000 from the proceeds of the sale of the boy.
But although, Samuel and Orinya said they knew nothing about the kidnap, the Benue State Police Command said there were evidence that they were the ones who kidnapped a child at the Daudu IDP camp sometime ago.
Spokesman of the Police in the state, DSP Moses Yamu, while parading the suspects, urged parents and guardians to be more watchful and vigilant about their children stressing that kidnappers are on the prowl everywhere now.
He stated that when the police led a team to Aba in Abia State, they were able to recover the baby but unfortunately the woman who bought the baby escaped before they could get to her.
On her part, mother of the stolen baby, Mercy Ajokwe, a mother of two, said she was elated that the police could rescue her child after almost two weeks that he was stolen.
