Pupils in various nursery schools in Bayelsa State yesterday resumed for a new session under the presence of armed soldiers deployed by the authorities of the Joint Military Task Force (JTF) to forestall rumoured invasion of the state by kidnappers.
A check at one of the nursery schools in the state where a parent foiled the December attempt to kidnap a child while he was being dropped off in school by his mother and police escort showed the heavy presence of armed soldiers.
The nursery school, known as Cedar Court International School, witnessed bubbling activities after the forced holiday that followed the ugly incident which compelled many schools to close down last term.
Leadership
observed that armed sentry of the Joint Task Force in the Niger Delta, took positions outside the premises.
Although the soldiers characteristically did not interfere with the civilian population, they, however, controlled parking and other vehicular movement on the popular Imgbi Road where the school is located.
There had been great anxiety in Yenagoa in December 2008 when the upsurge of child abductions led many schools to abandon the end-of-year celebrations for their pupils.
A vigilant parent had engaged the kidnappers of the three-year-old son of an aide to the state’s Commissioner of Finance and Budget in a scuffle as they forced the kid into a waiting car.
The parent, a lawyer, had just dropped of his own kids that morning when he noticed the commotion and incoherent wailing of the little boy’s mother.
His swift intervention and struggle with the abductors prevented them from taking the child away.
But another child in another nursery school was not that lucky. Men on motorcycles abducted the two-year old the following day.
The kidnappers were, however, arrested two days later in Ughelli, Delta State by men of the Bayelsa State police command who had tracked them down while pretending to pay the N500,000 ransom.