Three armed suspected Fulani kidnappers, Barri Galadima, Muhammadu Abdullahi, and Hussain Abdullah, have been arrested by the police in Osun State for attempting to abduct a fellow Fulani, Alhaji Idris Aliu.
The kidnappers were said to have earlier abducted a member of the same family and still shot him after collecting N4 million ransom.
According to Tribune, sources hinted that they attempted to do the same for his brother this time to collect another money before nemesis caught them.
The arrested criminals who were said to have perpetrated the dastardly act at a remote village in Oyo state were apprehended by the Osun police after a tip-off from the sister state.
Before their arrest, they were said to have engaged the Osun State Police Anti-Kidnapping Squad in a fierce gun duel leading to injury of one police officer before later being captured by the law enforcement agents.
The evil perpetrators, together with their other partners in crime, numbering about 30 said to have retreated and ran away while nemesis caught the three arrested ones.
The wounded police officer, however said to have been treated medically and is now in a stable condition of health.
Meanwhile, the state Commissioner of Police, CP Kehinde Longe, confirmed that, the Police Anti-Kidnapping Squad arrested the suspects in their hideout at a remote village in Oyo State and voided the attempt by the kidnappers to abduct one Alhaji Idris Aliu who is also a Fulani man.
Longe assured that the suspects would face the full wrath of the law and that their fleeing colleagues would be apprehended and prosecuted in no distance time.
Speaking with Tribune, two of the suspects, Galadima and Abdullahi confessed to the crime while the third suspect, Hussaini who is a Seriki Fulani in Afijio Local Government area of Oyo state denied his involvement.
Abdullahi said “Honestly, it is the offence of kidnapping, this man Barrister Galadima, met Sarki, who gave him a number of one man who would be a good target to kidnap. At that time I didn’t know the man, even now I don’t know him, but it was Sarki that gave Barri the number.”
Also, Galadima said “We planned a kidnapping operation and called one man, we continued calling him, demanding for a ransom but he didn’t give us. We then threatened to kidnap him if he doesn’t pay us a ransom. But before we could kidnap him, the Government came and apprehended us.”
In his own account, a kindred to one of the captives, Yisa Aliu said,” the kidnappers abducted his brother and shot him while in captive despite the payment of ransom by the family. “
According to him, “we have had terrible experiences in the hands of the kidnappers. They kidnapped my brother and shot him despite collecting a ransom of N4 million from us. They attended to kidnap my second brother Idrisu to collect money from us again. We ran to Seriki Toyin to help us. We reported to Anti-Kidnapping Policemen and they voided the attempt to kidnap Idrisu.”
Speaking on the matter, a leader of Fulanis in the state , Alhaji Sulaimon Oluwatoyin appreciated the state police command for it’s prompt response to distress calls.
He said, “We thank policemen for their prompt response always, the kidnappers engage the Police and shot one of them, yet the policemen arrested some of them. We thank the Policemen. In fact, they are tarnishing the name of the Fulanis and I am not happy to this.”