John Shiklam in Kaduna
A German Professor of Archaeology, Peter Breunij, and his colleague, Johannes Buringer, have been abducted by gunmen at Jenjela village in Kagarko Local Government Area of Kaduna State.
Kagarko shares boundary with Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and there had been repeated cases of kidnapping in the area in recent times.
Prof. Breunij is said to be the leader of a four-man team from the University of Frankfurt, Germany, working in Nigeria in collaboration with the National Commission for Museum and Monuments and other institutions on the relics of Nok culture in Nigeria.
The kidnappers however did not take along with them two ladies who are members of the team.
An eyewitness who was part of the team working with Germans said the incident happened when they resumed for work a site at Jenjela village and had started suddenly five gun men appeared from the bush and ordered them to lie down.
“They started coming one by one, the first two with machetes, then others came with heavy guns.
“There were many people at the site who were working there, so they ordered us to lay face down and started shooting into the air in order to scare people,” the eye witness who pleaded anonymity, said.
The eyewitness added: “It was at that point that they asked the professor and his associate to follow them and they led them to the other side of the road.
“They made them to cross the road to the other side from where we were and began to lead them further into the bush.”
The eyewitness added that it was after the abductors had crossed to the other side of the road with their victims that they got up from the ground to watch was going on.
However, the spokesman of the Kaduna State Police Command, Aliyu Usman, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), couldn’t immediately confirm the incident when contacted, saying he would get back.
He did not call back at the time of filing this report.
