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Deputy governor's dad abducted
11/12/2007 10:53 - (SA)
Lagos - Gunmen in oil-rich southern Nigeria have seized the 80-year-old father of the deputy governor of southern Bayelsa state, say police.
A senior police officer said: "The old man was abducted in the early hours of yesterday (Monday) by unidentified militants who came in speed boats."
He said the whereabouts of Simeon Ebebi, the father of Perembowei Ebebi, the deputy governor of Bayelsa state, were still unknown.
No group had claimed responsibility for the abduction, but the most vocal militant group in the restive region, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend), said it was not involved.
"Mend did not play a role in the abduction of the father of Bayelsa state deputy governor," said the group. It said political motives might have been responsible for the abduction.
Foreigners, oil workers 'targets'
It added: "We suspect that the kidnapping was carried out by aggrieved political thugs used and dumped after rigging the last election."
In the 18 months leading up to June 2007, militant and criminal gangs in the Niger Delta concentrated on kidnapping foreigners, mostly oil workers, seizing some 200 of them in that period.
As companies stepped up security measures expatriates became harder to abduct.
Starting in July, the gangs mostly switched to targeting the elderly parents and children of prominent Nigerians in the region, while continuing to seize foreigners when they could.
The unrest in the Niger Delta had reduced exports of Nigeria's 2.6 million barrels of crude per day at peak production by a quarter since the beginning of 2006.
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