By Samuel Oyadongha

Yenagoa—Armed men, yesterday, invaded Otuasega in Ogbia Local Government Area of Bayelsa State and abducted the council chairman, Mr. Enaye Abah.

The incident occurred at about 7.05am, along the Otuasega-Okarki Expressway.

According to eyewitnesses, four men armed with sophisticated weapons, blocked the official Prado Sport Utility Vehicle, SUV, of the council chairman with a blue Mazda car, believed to have been commandeered form the driver. Abah was about to negotiate a bend on the Otuasega stretch of the road.

The hoodlums were said to have demobilized the SUV conveying the chairman by firing at the front tyre, before embarking on a firing spree that rattled the sleepy settlement.

An eyewitness said the police orderly attached to the chairman abandoned his principal and ran for safety, on sighting the heavy arms and hearing the volley of gun shots.

The source said: “The hoodlums dragged the chairman from his vehicle and transferred him into a blue Mazda. They drove him away towards Okarki in Rivers State.

“On getting to Okarki waterside, he was dragged into to a waiting speed boat. The driver of the blue Mazda was shot in the leg for refusing to willingly follow the gunmen and their victim into the waiting speed boat.”

The gunmen set the Mazda ablaze.

Eyewitness account

A resident, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Vanguard at Okarki, a Rivers State border town with Bayelsa State, that the gunmen, on reaching the jetty, fired into the air and ordered everybody at the waterfront to lie on the ground.

They took the chairman and the injured driver into a waiting speedboat and disappeared into the creek.

Contacted, Bayelsa Police Public Relations Officer, Asinim Butswat, confirmed the incident, saying preliminary report showed that the abducted chairman was ferried by his abductors towards Abua waterways in Rivers State.

“Our men have been placed on red alert and we have put measures in place to rescue him,” Butswat said.

Meanwhile, Police have confirmed the release of Mr. Joseph Agama, cousin to the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, from kidnappers den.

According to the police, Joseph Agama, who was abducted on March 19, was released on April 8.

“The father sent me a text message that his son was released on Ekeowe-Olugbobiri waterway without payment of ransom,” Butswat said.