Gun Men Kidnapped Nigerian, and South African Workers in Cross River Yesterday, Kills Their Driver

A South African was among a group of employees of an Australian mining and engineering company, who were kidnapped in Nigeria on Wednesday. 

The workers were kidnapped after their vehicle was ambushed in the Nigerian state of Cross River. The driver of the vehicle, which belongs to Perth-based company Macmahon Holdings, was shot dead during the ambush.

The kidnapped were contractors for Macmahon’s cement company, Lafarge Africa.

According to reports by the local media, the armed kidnappers ambushed the vehicle under a bridge that runs over the Cross River, before fleeing with the hostages on a boat.

Conflicting reports from the Nigerian police about the incident led to initial confusion about the number of victims and nationalities of those involved.

According to Reuters, spokesperson for the Cross River state police, Irene Ugbo, said two of the kidnapped were Australian and one from New Zealand, with another police officer reportedly saying that another was South African.

Ugbo also said that two expatriates managed to flee, and that the kidnappers had not contacted the police about ransom.

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull confirmed the incident to the press, and urged journalists for calm in the way they reported this “very serious kidnapping”.

“These are the facts as we know them: three Australians and one Australian resident were among seven people kidnapped in an attack on an Australia contractor’s operations in Nigeria. One person was killed in the attack,” Turnbull told reporters.

Kidnappings of foreigners in Nigeria’s Delta region is not an uncommon occurrence. Many foreign companies operate in this south-east part of the country, which holds most of the crude oil whose sales make about 70 percent of Nigeria’s national income, but it’s not as common for the expatriates to be taken hostage.