Following the abduction of Rev. Mike Obiora, senior pastor of the Word Alive Church in Calabar, and his daughter yesterday evening, along with the chairman of the Inter-Party Advisory Council, IPAC, in Cross River State, Anthony Attah has urged Gov. Bassey Otu to take additional security measures beyond merely promising to apprehend those responsible.
Gertrude Njar, a female commissioner in Ayade’s government, was held captive for 35 days until being freed after a sizable ransom was paid.
The University of Calabar Teaching Hospital’s neurosurgeon, Prof. Ekanem Ephraim, was abducted on July 13, 2002, according to the Nigeria Medical Association in Cross River, which also revealed that 14 of its doctors had been abducted in the state over the course of five years.
“Kidnapping has become a recurring decimal in both the state capital and in the hinterlands, and the government has always maintained a well-rehearsed position,” Attah said
The government must take considerably more action than just vowing to apprehend the offenders and denouncing the atrocity.
Security services in the state, according to Attah, should step up their efforts to gather intelligence. He argued that since criminal elements cohabit with people, they are not from another planet.
The governor and the state alone are unable to deal with the hydra-headed monster of kidnapping plaguing communities all over the state, according to Attah, who claims this is why he constantly calling for a “viable and vibrant local government system.”
Beyond what is stated at the state capital and its surroundings, the level of kidnapping occurring in the rural areas is unquestionably a calamity, according to Attah.
