A man who recently escaped from suspected kidnappers in Kabba‑Bunu Local Government Area of Kogi State has accused villagers from a nearby settlement of betraying him by contacting the bandits shortly after he sought help.
The claim has stoked public alarm over possible complicity by local residents in the state’s growing insecurity.
The survivor claimed in a video shared online that after fleeing through bush paths, he reached a village close to Kabba-Bunu. Instead of offering refuge, some villagers allegedly called the kidnappers and even asked why he had been permitted to escape.
The man said this action nearly cost him his life. His identity has been withheld for security reasons.
KogiXCommunity, a local platform reporting on security and community affairs, flagged the case on X, warning that those loitering by the roadside in remote hamlets might not be bystanders but active informants for criminal elements.
The post urged the state government and security agencies to embed undercover operatives across vulnerable towns including villages around Kabba-Bunu.
This allegation gains resonance amid a surge of kidnappings along key routes in Kogi. Only weeks ago, troops from the Nigerian Army rescued 17 abducted travellers from an ambush on a bus along the Obajana–Lokoja highway.
The patrol, based at Apata in the 12 Brigade formation, found the bus abandoned, tracing the kidnappers’ path to Wuro Village in Adavi Local Government Area, where the captors fled into the bush after encountering army firepower.
Security-agency operations have also in recent months uncovered a wider criminal network in Kogi that involves local collaborators supplying food, fuel, and information to bandits operating in forests, especially around Kabba/Bunu, Ijumu, Yagba East and Yagba West Local Government Areas.
In one crackdown early this year by the state security apparatus, 26 suspects, including natives implicated as logistical enablers, were arrested in the Bunu Forest region.
Local residents have responded with outrage to the latest allegation of betrayal. Many question how a man seeking escape from terror could be turned in by those presumed to offer sanctuary.
Calls are growing for urgent investigations into informants, stronger community-based intelligence gathering, and deployment of patrol or undercover units to towns along notorious transit corridors linking Kabba-Bunu, Yagba and Lokoja.
As of this writing no official response has been issued by the state government or the Nigeria Police Force addressing the specific claims.
