Abductors of 23 Greenfield University students and staff in Kaduna State, have threatened to kill the remaining students in their captivity if the government fails to pay the ransom they had earlier demanded by Tuesday.
The bandits disclosed this in an interview with the Hausa Service of the Voice of America, VOA, in which they also confirmed that they recently killed five of their victims to show government’s failure.
The bandits had made a demand of ₦800 million after abducting the students, but three days after their demands were not met, they killed three students before murdering an additional two a few days later.
One Sani Idris Jalingo, an alleged leader of the group in the interview with the VOA, said if the Kaduna State Government or the families of the abducted students fail to pay a ransom of ₦100 million, added with 10 brand new Honda motorcycles by Tuesday, the remaining students will be murdered.
Jalingo however revealed that the families of the students have already paid N55 million to them which they used to feed the students.
“We heard the utterances of the Kaduna State governor (Nasir El-Rufai) that he will not pay any ransom to bandits to purchase additional weapons. He also said he informed his family that he will not pay any ransom if any of them gets kidnapped. So, we want to show that the Nigerian government has failed and that is why we killed the students,” he said.
Some of the students who spoke during the interview, also appealed to the government and their parents to take the threats seriously.
One of the students identified as a grandchild of the 18th Emir of Zazzau, Shehu Idris, called on the government to negotiate with their captors.
“They mean what they say because they have already killed some of us,” he said.
It would recalled that the remains of three of the abducted students were discovered on April 23. Three days later, two more students were murdered by their abductors, bringing the total death toll from the attack to six.
