The Imo State Police Command has located the hideout where suspected kidnappers are holding abducted National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members and other victims, but a major security threat has slowed efforts to rescue them.
Commissioner of Police Audu Garba Bosso disclosed that security operatives used drones to track the abductors into the bush and pinpoint the location of their camp.
However, he said operatives could not immediately move into the area after intelligence indicated that the camp had been heavily mined with improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
“Yesterday we were in the bush; we trailed them up to a particular location. But at that point in time, we couldn’t move in to where the coordinates showed us where they are,” he said.
Bosso explained that although the drones successfully provided the exact coordinates of the abductors’ location, the suspected presence of explosives around the camp had created a dangerous obstacle for the rescue team.
“But our predicament is that with the intel we have, the camp is mined with IEDs,” Bosso said.
The police commissioner said security forces were preparing to deploy specialised equipment, including high-velocity vehicles, bulldozers and armoured personnel carriers (APCs), to gain access to the area and safely evacuate the victims.
“We are moving in there with high-velocity vehicles. We are moving with bulldozers and APCs to see how we are going to rescue these victims,” he said.
The victims were among passengers abducted after suspected gunmen attacked two buses along the Owerri-Onitsha Expressway on October 1.
The buses were reportedly conveying prospective corps members travelling from Ibadan to orientation camps in the South-East and South-South when they came under attack around the Umunoha axis of the road in Mbaitoli Local Government Area of Imo State.
The Imo State Police Command had earlier reported that 10 victims were rescued at the scene, while efforts were underway to establish the exact number of people still being held by the abductors.
The Defence Headquarters later disclosed that 20 passengers were abducted from the two buses, including several prospective corps members, while 10 passengers, eight of them identified as prospective corps members, had been rescued.
It said a joint search-and-rescue operation involving troops of Operation Udoka, the Nigeria Police Force and the Department of State Services, with support from the Nigerian Air Force, was ongoing to locate and rescue the remaining victims.
