After spending five days with a gang of suspected kidnappers, a 16-year-old-daugher of a lecturer, Miss Precious Esther Ukachukwu, miraculously escaped from her captors in a remote forest in Abia State.
The victim was abducted by a four-man gang at the staff school of the university on Monday, October 24 at 4.30pm but returned five days later with eyes swollen with tears and distress. The victim, who is the eldest daughter of Professor of Animal Nutrition and Forage Sciences at the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, S. N Ukachukwu, told Daily Sun that she had gone to pick her younger sister from school when her assailants accosted her and forcefully dragged her into a waiting car at gun point.
She later found herself in a thick forest, without any clue of the location because her assailants blindfolded her throughout the ride. A close friend of the family told Daily Sun that the kidnappers called her family two days later and demanded N50million or the option of killing the victim and trading her body parts for rituals. Daily Sun gathered that the family went into fervent prayers and intercession for the release of the victim. A reliable source told our reporter that the incident aroused Christian brethren from all over the state and even beyond, who fervently interceded for the release of the victim.
The Ukachukwu family was learnt to be a strong Christian family, with Prof. S. N. Ukachukwu, serving as the current chairman of Council of the Chapel of Revelation (University Chapel) Umudike. He is also the current regional chairman of Scripture Union Campus Fellowship, Okigwe Region. Negotiation continued with kidnappers the next day, bringing the ransom down to N20million. It was gathered that the father of the victim, Prof. Ukachukwu, was so grieved in the spirit that he dared the kidnappers by prophesying that no harm would ever befall her daughter.
Like Elijah that challenged the prophets of Baal, a duel was cast between the ungodly gang and the pious family. While the hoodlums hatched their next evil plot in their den, Ukachukwu and his family went into their cocoon for marathon prayers and intercession. Daily Sun was reliably informed that it was not up to 40 minutes after the prayer, when the abducted girl arrived the house in the company of two men. The men met her crying and stranded on the road and volunteered to bring her home.
Narrating her ordeal in the hands of the kidnappers, Ukachukwu said she was given only bread and water throughout the period. Although she claimed the hoodlums didn’t assault her, mosquitoes vent their spleen on her throughout the five days and nights. She said one of the kidnappers told her they had been monitoring her family to abduct her mother, Obioma Ukachukwu, who was a pharmacist but failed. She said the kidnappers took her from one part of the forest to the other, praying for the success of their mission.
According to her, the kidnappers were also begging her to pray with them, so that their operation would be successful, especially for his father to pay up on time if not, they would be forced to kill her to cover their traces.
She confessed that the anguish of remaining in the bush so tormented her soul to give up but she drew strength from the admonition of her father, who repeatedly encouraged her to pray and use the scriptural passages she memorised.
On the day of her escape, Ukachukwu said she over- heard the kidnappers negotiating with her dad on the ransom, which ended with a final threat to kill her for rituals if he failed to grant their request the nest day. Shortly after the call, a sharp dispute broke out among the members of the gang on whether to kill her or wait for the payment of the ransom.
It was a case of prayer melting the most hardened heart. Ukachukwu said one of the kidnappers, who could not withstand her being killed the next day, quickly took her and dashed out of the bush until they got to a tarred road.
By SAM OTTI
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