Protesting youths block Benin-Abuja highway over kidnapping, killings

Youths, mostly students, have protested against the killing by kidnappers of a Master’s degree holder of Ambrose Alli University (AAU) in Ekpoma, Miss Ella Williams, blocking the busy Benin-Ekpoma-Auchi-Abuja Road.

The protesters also demanded an end to the incessant kidnappings and killings along that road.
Motorists and commuters using that road on Wednesday were stranded for many hours during the protests that led to a standstill.
The obstruction started from 6am at Ehor in the Uhunmwonde Local Government Area of Edo State, found to be now notorious for the kidnapping of innocent travellers, who would be forced into the forest, with huge ransoms regularly paid by their relatives.
Commuters and motorists from Benin had to go through the longer Agbor Road in Delta State, before linking the Auchi-Abuja Road.
Williams met her untimely death while about picking her call-up letter, ahead of the one-year mandatory National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, but the kidnappers opened fire on the vehicle that she was travelling in, killing her on the spot, while other injured passengers were still seized.
One of the protesting residents of Ehor, Francis Okhomina, told reporters that no fewer than five people were shot by kidnappers in the area on Monday, with two of them later confirmed dead, while the three others were seriously injured and still receiving treatment in an undisclosed hospital.
Okhomina added that in spite of the efforts of military personnel, policemen, operatives of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, and members of vigilante groups, the kidnappers with sophisticated arms and ammunition were still operating freely.
Edo State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Bello Kontongs, a Superintendent of Police (SP), did not answer the many calls to his MTN line.