Goodluck Jonathan on a mission to stem the rise of kidnappings

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan vowed on Thursday to stem the rising spate of kidnappings in the country which he said was a "menace" to development.

"The issue of kidnapping is a problem that the government must tackle frontally and I have decided that we will tackle it frontally," Jonathan said during a meeting of leaders of his ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) in Abuja.

"We can no longer continue to live in a society where even if your wife is going to church, you have to look for an APC (Armoured Personnel Carrier) to follow her. If the children are going to school, you have to look for machine gun-carrying security people to follow them," he said.

Kidnappings for ransom by criminal gangs which used to be restricted to the country's oil-producing south, have recently spread to the south-east Igbo region.

The police said last week more than 300 suspected kidnappers, mostly the Igbo ethnic community, had been arrested since February.

Jonathan said the situation in the south-eastern state of Abia was so alarming that the government could no longer accept it.

"I am saying now that we will spend the last money government has to crush this terrible menace because without security we can't even develop," he added.

iol

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