In a heart-pounding tale of resilience and community resolve, Alhaji Kamilu Salami, the revered Ojibara of Bayagan in Kwara State’s Ifelodun Local Government Area, has escaped the clutches of armed bandits alongside six other captives. The dramatic breakout occurred late Sunday evening, following a daring midnight raid by local vigilante operatives that sent the kidnappers fleeing into the dense forests of Eku Idaji, near the town of Igbaja. This incident, unfolding just over 24 hours after Salami’s abduction, has injected a wave of cautious optimism into Bayagan, a bustling agrarian community long plagued by the shadow of banditry, while underscoring the escalating security challenges in Nigeria’s North Central region.
The ordeal began on a seemingly ordinary Saturday morning, November 29, 2025, around 9:30 a.m., when Salami, a 62-year-old traditional ruler known for his hands-on approach to farming and community leadership, was tending to his riverside farmland on the outskirts of Bayagan. Bayagan, one of the largest settlements in Ifelodun LGA—home to over 20,000 residents primarily engaged in subsistence agriculture and petty trading—lies approximately 45 kilometers southeast of Ilorin, Kwara’s capital. The area’s fertile floodplains along the Asa River make it a hotspot for yam, maize, and guinea corn cultivation, but these same remote fields have increasingly become hunting grounds for criminal gangs exploiting the region’s porous borders with Niger and Kogi states.
Eyewitness accounts paint a vivid picture of the chaos. A farmer from a neighbouring village, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety, recounted hiding amid tall guinea corn stalks when the assailants struck. “I saw everything from about 50 metres away,” he told reporters via phone on Sunday. “There were four or five men, all armed with AK-47 rifles. They fired shots into the air to scare off the other workers, then grabbed the Ojibara. They forced him onto one of their motorcycles—his own was left behind—and sped into the bush toward the river path.” Salami’s abandoned motorcycle, a battered red Honda model commonly used for farm errands, became the first clue that ignited panic. Fellow farmers, alerted by the gunfire, raised the alarm within minutes, mobilising villagers to scour the vicinity. By midday, word of the kidnapping had spread like wildfire through Bayagan’s thatched-roof homes and dusty market stalls, transforming a day of routine labour into one of collective dread.
The bandits wasted no time in asserting their demands. In the early hours of Sunday, they placed a frantic call to community leaders, allowing Salami to speak briefly as proof of life. His voice, described by listeners as “trembling yet resolute,” carried the weight of desperation. “They’ve taken me deep into the forest—over five hours on rough motorcycle trails,” he reportedly pleaded, urging his people to negotiate swiftly. “There are others here too, from nearby villages. Please, do what you must for our safe return.” The kidnappers then issued their ultimatum: N150 million (approximately $95,000 USD at current exchange rates), a staggering sum for a community where the average annual income hovers around N500,000 per household. This figure, while exorbitant, aligns with the audacious ransoms seen in recent Kwara abductions, where gangs have netted millions by targeting high-profile figures like traditional rulers, whose symbolic status amplifies community pressure to pay.
As negotiations teetered on the brink, hope flickered from an unexpected quarter: Bayagan’s vigilante network. Comprising over 200 volunteers—mostly young farmers and ex-security personnel—the group has evolved since its informal inception in 2022 into a semi-organised force, patrolling farmlands with rudimentary weapons and collaborating sporadically with the Nigeria Police Force and Operation Harmony, Kwara’s joint security task force. Drawing on intelligence from terrified locals and a tip from a herder who overheard the bandits’ campfire chatter, the vigilantes mobilised under the cover of darkness. Around midnight on Sunday, a 15-member team, armed with dane guns, cutlasses, and a few smuggled pistols, infiltrated the Eku Idaji forest—a sprawling 200-square-kilometre expanse of acacia thickets and seasonal streams that serves as a natural corridor for cross-border smuggling.
What ensued was a fierce, lopsided gun battle that echoed through the night. “The vigilantes came like ghosts, shouting war cries and firing into the camp,” one escapee later shared via a garbled phone signal from a nearby village. The bandits, caught off-guard and outnumbered in the melee, abandoned their tents and captives in a frantic retreat, vanishing into the underbrush with whatever loot they could carry. Salami and the six others—comprising three farmers from Igbaja, two women traders abducted en route to market, and a teenage herder—seized the moment, fleeing on foot through the moonlit trails. Among them was 45-year-old Aisha Mohammed, whose own kidnapping two days prior had gone unreported amid the monarch’s high-profile seizure.
By dawn, the escapees had reached a safer outpost in Igbaja, where they borrowed phones to contact Bayagan. “We’re alive, bruised but unbroken,” Salami assured elders in a voice note that circulated rapidly on WhatsApp groups. “The vigilantes saved us—tell our people to pray for the warriors still hunting those animals.” Though physical reunion awaits—delayed by swollen ankles and the need for medical checks—these messages have quelled the initial terror, with women in Bayagan’s central mosque leading dawn prayers of thanksgiving on Monday.
This escape is not merely a local victory but a stark reminder of Nigeria’s deepening insecurity crisis. Kwara State, once touted as a “model of peace” in the volatile Middle Belt, has seen a 45% surge in kidnapping incidents since 2023. Banditry here often spills over from Zamfara and Niger states, where heavily armed herder-farmer clashes have displaced thousands. In Ifelodun alone, at least 12 abductions were recorded in the past six months, including a mass snatching of 38 worshippers from a riverine mosque in October that ended only after a N20 million payout. Experts attribute this to weak border controls, proliferation of small arms from Libya’s post-Gaddafi chaos, and economic desperation fuelled by soaring inflation—Nigeria’s rate hit 34.7% in October 2025.
Community leaders, including Ifelodun LGA Chairman Alhaji Muhammad Sambo, hailed the vigilantes as “unsung heroes” but called for bolstered state support. “These young men risk their lives with sticks and stones against assault rifles,” Sambo said in a statement. “We need more drones, more checkpoints, and federal funding for community policing.” Kwara’s Commissioner of Police, Victor Olunode, confirmed ongoing joint operations, with tactical teams combing Eku Idaji as of Monday afternoon. “Two suspects have been injured and are under pursuit; we urge the public to provide tips,” he added, emphasising a no-ransom policy to deter future attacks.
For Salami, whose role as Ojibara—literally “head of the district” in Yoruba tradition—entails mediating disputes and preserving cultural rites, the trauma runs deep. Installed in 2018 after a contentious chieftaincy tussle, he has championed youth empowerment programmes, including a cooperative that trained 150 farmers in climate-resilient techniques last year. His farm, spanning 10 hectares of yam tubers and cassava, symbolises Bayagan’s agrarian heartbeat. “The Ojibara is our father, our shield,” said 28-year-old trader Fatima Yusuf, who joined a vigil outside the district head’s compound. “His return will heal us, but until the forests are safe, fear lingers.”
As the sun sets on December 1, Bayagan buzzes with preparations: mats laid for a homecoming feast, drummers tuning their talking drums for celebratory beats. Yet, beneath the relief lies a sobering call to action. “One escape doesn’t end the war,” reflected community scribe Mallam Ibrahim, poring over ancient scrolls in the palace annex. “Bandits evolve; so must we.” With security sweeps intensifying and national eyes turning to Kwara, this story of defiance could catalyse broader reforms—or serve as another fleeting triumph in a nation weary of headlines. For now, in the heart of Ifelodun, hope endures, one escaped soul at a time.
