Despite paying N7 million ransom to secure his release, bandits have murdered Shila Ojebola, a Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) staff, family sources told Peoples Gazette. 

Mr Ojebola, 47, was recently promoted to a manager at the FIRS’ Medium & Small Tax Office in Lugbe, sources said.

The promotion was said to have come when Mr Ojebola was in the bandits’ camp after he was kidnapped along Abuja-Kaduna Highway about three weeks ago.

“He was promoted to the post of a manager while in their camp,” said a family source.

The Gazette also learnt that the police and State Security Service (SSS) were involved in the ransom after the bandits demanded N7 million.

The Gazette could not immediately reach the spokesperson for the police in Abuja, Josephine Adeh, to confirm their role in the matter.

Over the past year, the Abuja-Kaduna Highway has become a danger zone with massive kidnappings and killings of travellers.

Among a series of attacks on the highway, The Gazette had reported that a traveller was killed while many were abducted on November 11.

The ambush took place near Gadar Malam Mamman, a few kilometres to the highway’s most dangerous kidnapping spot, Rijana.

Also, a Nigerian Army colonel SB Onifade was abducted by bandits on the same road after running into an ambush.

Mr Onifade was on a road trip at about 3:00 a.m. on September 27 when he was abducted.