Osiyo Agama: freed

Osiyo Agama, the kidnapped sister of Nigeria’s oil minister, who was abducted last week in the oil city of Port Harcourt, was freed in a joint operation by security forces, police said Wednesday.

“Osiyo Agama has been safely rescued during a joint operation by the police, military and SSS (State Security Service),” Rivers state police spokesman Ahmad Muhammad said.

Muhammad said two suspects had been arrested over the October 21 abduction of Agama, whose sister Diezani Alison-Madueke leads Africa’s largest oil industry.

Agama is a self-employed, E-Library consultant. She was returning from Church when she was kidnapped last week.

Muhammad did not say if ransom was paid for the release, the latest targetting relations of prominent Nigerians in recent months.

One of the most prominent cases came in December 2012, when Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala’s 82-year-old mother Kamene Okonjo was abducted from her home, in neighbouring Delta state.

Okonjo-Iweala and Alison-Madueke are widely seen as the two most powerful members of President Goodluck Jonathan’s cabinet.

Jonathan’s 70-year-old uncle was also kidnapped earlier this year in Bayelsa state, also in the Niger Delta.

Some have sought to attach a political motive to attacks targeting Nigeria’s most powerful families.

Also corroborating the release of Agama,the Ijaw Youths Council (IYC), in a press statement issued in Port Harcourt, said its members in the Eastern Zone helped with information that facilitated the rescue operation.

The IYC charged government at all levels to make job creation a priority to reduce criminal activities across the country.

The statement, signed by the spokesman of the IYC, Eric Omare, revealed that Agama was released in Asari-Toru council area of Rivers State in the late hours of Wednesday, following the combined efforts of security agents and members of the IYC, Eastern zone.

The statement said current and incoming governments would be able to sufficiently curb all forms of crimes, especially kidnapping, if they make job creation and other forms of positive engagements a priority.

*Updated with the statement of Ijaw Youth Council