Buba Galadima, a close associate-turned-critic of President Muhammadu Buhari says Federal and state governments have been lying over non-payment of ransom for victims of recent school kidnappings in the country.
There have been three major school kidnappings in Nigeria this year, the latest being the abduction of over 30 students of Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation, Mando, Kaduna State.
After 42 persons, including 27 students, were kidnapped from a school in Kagara, Niger State and later released in February, the State Governor, Abubakar Sani-Bello, stated that no ransom was paid for their release.
When 317 schoolgirls were kidnapped from a school in Jangebe, Zamfara State, and later released shortly after, the State Governor, Bello Matawalle equally said that no ransom was paid.
But in an interview with Sunday Sun, Buba Galadima insisted that nothing could be farther from the truth.
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He said that the government had been caught lying over many previous matters in the past and therefore should not be believed.
Galadima, who was Chairman of the defunct CPC, explained that the government either paid ransom in cash or swapped the kidnap victims for detained comrades of the abductors.
“You and I know that even if the government denies that they pay ransom, they are only lying about it.
“How can we trust them, knowing that they had said one million and one things in the past in which they were found wanting. They have shortfall of trust.
“I want to tell you that whenever people are kidnapped, whether they say it or not, some forms of compensations are being made to them.
“Condition with which they release kidnap victims is either they give them money or swap them with the already caught bandits. And in that case, those ones will now go and give them the story of where they were.
“Forget about what the government is saying that they don’t pay ransom. I don’t trust them. There is nobody among them I can believe,” Galadima stated.
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