•Kill 6 in Onitsha, 12 on danger list
From OKEY SAMPSON, Aba
Emmanuel Agbesi is the assembly pastor of the Mountain of Fire and Miracle Ministries (MFM), South East Province Two headquarters in Aba, Abia State. On Monday, February 18, 2013, he was abducted by three men in Aba. He was heading to his church on Ndusoro Street, off Ngwa Road in his Volkswagen Golf-car when the hoodlums stopped him at gun point. As he stopped, the kidnappers jumped into his car and ordered him to drive towards the Umangasi axis of the city. Having been warned he (pastor) should not do anything funny or his life would be wasted, he obeyed them and that began his ordeal.
This is his story: “On February 18, 2013, I was coming from my house, No. 11 Ndusoro Street to the church. On getting to a junction on the road early that morning, three men stopped me. I thought they were policemen because they had guns. They asked me to open the door of my car. I did and two of them went to the back seat and the third one sat in the front with me and ordered me to move. While I was moving they hit me by the side with guns, that I should move faster, I obeyed.
“As we proceeded, I asked them where we were going, they said I should shut up and move. When we passed by our church, I became apprehensive, but they said I should keep going. At a point, they asked, ‘where is the money’? I told them I had no agreement with them about any money. We kept going. They were directing me where to go because they already warned me that if I made any noise or effort to stop them, they were ready to die and before then, they would make sure my own life was wasted, that I should try to cooperate with them.
“So we kept going and on getting to the Umungasi area, they asked me to stop. They searched and took everything I had on me. As I wanted to move, they said I should come down and get to the back seat and one of them took over the car. As we moved, before we got to any army checkpoint, they would look me straight in the eyes and warned me not to do any thing funny before the soldiers, that they were ready to kill me and waste their own lives, which they said were of no value to them. “But on getting to Umuikaa junction, along the Enugu/Part Harcourt Expressway, there was an incident.
The soldiers were doing thorough checking, they were checking booths of vehicles and asking questions; in fact, there was traffic build-up due to the thoroughness of the soldiers. “So when my abductors observed what was going on, again they warned me not to shout, that they were ready to die and that they will waste my life before dying. The next thing I noticed was that the one driving just zoomed off and one of the soldiers was shouting ‘stop!, stop! The driver was fast and he drove past the checkpoint, heading towards Umuahia. As we were moving, the kidnappers were watching if the soldiers were coming after them and when they observed that nobody was chasing them, they made a U-turn and headed towards Owerri, through Owerrinta.
“When we got to Owerri, they headed towards Owerri- Onitsha Expressway and on getting to the Coca-Cola spot, and not too far, they made U-turn. As they were moving, they were making phone calls; I didn’t know who they were talking to. After the phone calls, they immediately turned right and veered off the expressway, parked and then asked me to come down, which I did. I followed them through a path and we entered a bush near the Immigration office. It was there I sustained injuries because they forced me to sit down, beat me and many times threatened to kill me. “They collected my two handsets and other things I had on me.
They opened the handsets, collected the SIM cards and threw them on the ground, saying they had no need for my type of handsets. As the beating and threats continued, there was this sound of siren blaring from an on coming vehicle. Then next thing, one of them alerted others. And for fear it was police that was coming after them, one of them said, ‘let’s leave this man and go.’ Another one disagreed and said they should take me along with them. The third said ‘no we cannot go with him’ and they started arguing whether to go with me or not. Eventually they fled, leaving me behind. “As they left I got up and managed to walk out to the road through the bush path with only one leg of rubber slippers.
When I regained consciousness, I saw the two handsets, but without the SIM cards and the batteries. I also saw my wallet, but they had taken all the money in it. While looking for the car key, I came out to an open place, there I saw people. “I met a man waiting for a commercial vehicle and I enquired from him where I was. I have forgotten what he called the place. I also asked him to direct me to where I could make a call. It was only my wife’s number that I could readily recollect. When I called, she did not pick because the number was strange to her. But after several attempts, she picked and I told her my story. She then called the church members who then contacted the police to rescue me back to Aba.
“Before the incident, there had been several threats on my life from the children of our late landlord, who sold a piece of land to the church. They claimed I was the one preventing them from enjoying their fathers’ property. They had harassed church members severally on this issue and the police were aware of their previous actions. The men, Kelechi Kingsley Orji Ugwumba and Ogbonnaya Orji Ugwumba once came to the church to threaten the senior pastor with cutlass, and they have fought us physically on several occasions. “Again on Sunday, a day before my abduction, during the church service which I conducted, we saw four unknown faces patrolling the premises in all-black attire and on Monday I was kidnapped.
One of my captors was wearing the same black dress.”Based on these earlier threats to life, immediately the incident happened, police in Aba were alerted and the area commander, Rabiu Dayi (ACP), mobilized his men led by Anari N. Anari into action. The police arrested the two Ugwumba brothers who had threatened to kidnap the pastor. As at the time of filing this report, the two arrested men were still helping the police in their investigations.
Very sad story. I thought that kidnapping had stopped?
“Touch not My anointed and do my prophets no harm”.
Seyi Oluwaseyi,flesh and blood and has not revealed this to you.But my father in heaven.They did not know that the pastor of mountain of fire is a son of thunder and fire and as they kidnapped him they had the host of heaven to contend with .God immediately dispatched heavenly anti crime squad Angels to go after them and that is the cause of the confusion that God caused in them.These will be the end of these hoodlums.When you kidnapped a child of God is like when you carry a hot coal of fire under your armpit.You will get burnt.
What are the Soldiers,
are they not just Human?
What happened was a confirmation that the Bible verse that says ‘Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain, its the truth.
The Soldiers wouldn’t know since the Pastor was earlier warned not to act anything funny which he maintained to save his life for his family and work of the Church of God. They (hoodlums) are ready to die. Lets just thank God for His grace that nothing happened to Pastor.
Pastor, Congratulations!
why would his landlord children result to kidnapping for Christ sake?
“enjoying there father’s land”
Can u imagine wot two adults are saying at ds jet age dt everyone is ttrying hard to make a name fr hs or hersef they are busy strategizing on enjoying there fathers sweat.
These shuld be d lazy youths of that city,all they are good at is collecting titles frm land there fathers sold years back.
The Nigerian Army should hear this story. Their men formed roadblocks to check for kidnappers and kidnappers zoomed past them at a roadblock doing nothing to make an arrest. No chasing, no shooting down of the vehicle’s tyres and no help was sorted by them to track down the culprits. May be the movement was not suspicious enough for them to act. But the soldiers know how to shoot down innocent Nigerian Students for a peaceful and legitimate protest. What a joke?
Chineke mie ,Ndidgbo nwere ndiala .
so igbo don get omoinile.
NA WAA OOH MAKE I HEAR ANY 1 OF YOU TALK ABOUT OMOINILE AGAIN.
THE ONLY PEOPLE I KNOW IS THE IKWERRE THAT ALWAYS CLAIM AND KILL FOR LAND “for papa land kwanu” ( ALA NDAM)
I agree with you Christopher ihejirika need hear this? How can the kiddnepers defile army check point and know effort to stop them , who know how many that escape them already
@Christopher, you can not blame the Army much because their new role to maintain security in our troubled towns and cities is an aberration because their primary duty is to ward off aggressors around our territories or fight civil wars within Nigeria to keep the country one but their new role to maintain peace and order within Nigeria is due to inefficiency of Police whose duty the Army have taken over since Nigeria has become brutalised due to militancy, boko haram, kidnapping and bank robberies etc, etc.
The Army are trained to shoot and kill, so they could have wasted all the occupants of the kidnappers’ car if they have opened fire on the car to stop them.
We should introduce police state with strong federal laws to complement the inadequacies and inefficiency of the one structured federal Police force that is now incapable to face the security challenges threatened the foundation of Nigeria.
The State Police will absorb some of our Graduates of Universities and Polytechnics who are jobless while such state police will be more polite and efficient if Graduates are recruited for all cadres.
The Army were busy extorting money from motorist,and nothing more,it‘s so unfortunate that the Army are now more corrupt than the police,if you don‘t believe,travel from Otukpa branch to Enugu at night and see what‘s called extortion from the Army,each and every truck must pay #400 per check point(your money na #400)is what they normally say,it‘s surprising,travelling at night on that road through Enugu is HELL.They should know that nothing last forever and God Almighty is watching.
I said it last time that, these army guys were busy collecting money from motorist and as a result was ignorant of what was happening with the man and the kidnapers. these soldiers really need to seat up, otherwise, the so called smelling police will be better than them oooooooo.Gbam
MY BRETHEREN MOST OF THE SOLDIERS AND POLICE YOU SEE ON THE ROAD ARE MAINLY OGA BOYS OR WHO PAID BRIBE TO BE THERE. SOME OGA USES ROAD BLOCK TO COMPENSATE IS BOYS. HAVE YOU NOT CHECKED/NOTICED? ALWAYS THE SAME FACE OR THE SAME PEOPLE. GOD HELP US!
Ngwa people very lazy…. the yorubas of igbo land
Mazi fedlis,you must be an ignoranmous of the highest order to insinuate that we are lazy people.I do not know which part of Igboland you leld from anyway,otherwise,it would have provided me the right latitude to deal with your junk mind set.The issue here is about a land deal gone awry which is a common factor in every where especially in the southern Nigeria.As a Nigerian who has travelled across this country landscape and also a property owner outside igboland.I am in a good stead to say that dispute over a piece of land is a common place and therefore is nothing particular with our highly Industrous Ngwa people of and aborigin owners of Aba and its environ who also constitute 70% population of Abia state.It is therefore unexpected to have issues of this nature with indigenes.Besides, that landed property is located in Aba does not automatically imply that this family laying claim to it are Ngwa aborigine.Aba is cosmopolitan city .Hence,prpoerties could have changed hands over time as most of the property owners are non indigens who have been doing there business there over years as in other cities like lagos,kaduna,port harcourt,etc.So,I do not understand where laziness reason for your assault to us emanated from in case except perhaps you must have hidious animosity against us for being who we are.
I agreed with you Sir… Ngwa People are the most Lazy people on earth … take it or leave it….Very Greedy people who don’t labor but depends on another mans effort..
The Yorubas are a hard working Lot, and the evidence is transparent and commonplace in Nigera. Glory to God!
I THINK PASTORS CLAIM THEY HAVE SOME POWERS
@malcomx,what do u understand by power?where&when has any pastor told u he has powers? whatever a pastor,priest&any man of God does is by the name & power of Jesus&it is this name that threw the kidnappers into confusion.To u those that want to bequeath the world to their children,u are only breeding laziness for them.Hardly will u see the sons of succesful men growing richer to surpass his father,it is either they sit on top of it or they start selling the properties one after the other.U rather see sons of poor men progress rapidly
I totally dis agree with those of you railing the army for not shooting at the escaping car.That would have meant killing of innocent people.I am sure that with revelation that the commander has taken note and would accordingly instruct his men to be extra vigilant.As an Abia elder citizen and a community leader ,am aware that these soldiers are doing wonderful surveilance job especially in our rural villages where these hoodlums are based.I can say without contradictions that live has returned to normalcy to our villages.I was glad to receive briefing from my family people in the village that many of our youths in diaspora came home last December with their jeeps and there has not been any incident of security problem because of the ubiqous presence of these soldiers,Gen.Ihejirika’s boys.Who apparently is the son of the soil,God’s own state and knows where the shoe pinches.Thank you Gen.Ihejirika for your wonderful job in our nation and for your absolute loyalty to Mr. President.and thank you Mr.President for having faith in the person of coas…
Thanj God that the pastor got rescued.This must be a DIVINE intervention.But the soldiers shld pls sit up.
I really thank God for ur life.police should continue been alert always.
Christopher, I tire oooo! Big lapse there on the part of the soldiers.
Thank God they did not tought his life.