NYSC members abduction along the volatile Owerri-Onitsha Expressway in IMO State has sparked widespread outrage, prompting Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential candidate Adewole Adebayo to demand their immediate rescue and a comprehensive overhaul of national youth protection protocols.
Gunmen ambushed commercial transit buses conveying prospective National Youth Service Corps members around the Umunoha corridor in Mbaitoli Local Government Area as they traveled from Ibadan toward orientation camps in Bende, Abia State.
While joint military and tactical police operatives successfully intercepted the ambush and freed 10 victims at the scene, several other corps members remain held hostage in unknown forest enclaves.
NYSC Members Abduction Prompts Urgent Calls to Governors and Security Chiefs
Adebayo described the highway attack as an unprovoked assault on young Nigerians who volunteered to foster national cohesion through mandatory civil service.
“We cannot fold our arms while the youth of this nation, who have committed themselves to national integration and service, are hunted down like game on public highways,” Adebayo stated in an official release.
The political leader instructed security leadership, including the Inspector-General of Police and the military high command, to mobilize all surveillance assets and emergency response squads to secure their safe release without delay.
According to investigative security dispatches reviewed by The Guardian, coordinated search-and-rescue sweeps remain underway throughout border communities.
Adebayo Demands Interstate Security Coordination Across 3 States
Adebayo urged the governors of Imo, Abia, and Anambra states to suspend ceremonial government engagements and treat the border security breach with utmost emergency priority.
“I am calling on the Governors of Anambra, Abia, and Imo states to drop everything they are doing right now,” Adebayo declared, insisting that citizen safety supersedes partisan and political activities.
The SDP flag bearer stressed that recurrent highway abductions expose critical gaps in transit intelligence and regional patrol frequency along known danger corridors.
He appealed for modern real-time tracking systems and permanent military checkpoints along interstate bypasses to shield vulnerable travelers from repeat ambushes.
Long-Term Policy Reforms Required for Transit Protection
Beyond immediate extraction operations, Adebayo insisted on a holistic structural reform governing how corps members are deployed and transported across the country.
The campaign organization warned that exposing young graduates to preventable armed violence undermines public confidence in the scheme’s founding objectives.
Tactical teams, intelligence units, and local community vigilantes are currently scouring nearby forests to neutralize the criminal syndicate and reunite the remaining hostages with their families.
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