Some victims of kidnappers just freed from captivity have revealed how their captors used poisonous snakes to terrorise them.
The victims narrated their ordeals in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria, said that there were many snakes in the forests inhabited by the bandits.
They said that the snakes bit both the kidnappers and the victims.
One of them, who craved anonymity, told NAN that the kidnappers threw them into snake-infested spots.
“The kidnappers know the areas infested with snakes and would often throw the victims there,” he said.
“Immediately they see snakes, the fear-stricken victims will want to run away. The sight is used to frighten people.
“That is the time a victim can ask friends and family members to sell everything – house, land, cars, household items, shoes, just everything – to raise the ransom.
NAN investigation revealed that the worst snake-infested forests are in Birnin Gwari in Kaduna State, and Kala-Balge, near Lake Chad, in Borno.
Other areas included Shaki in Oyo State, Borgu and Kagara in Niger, Karim Lamido in Adamawa, and Lau in Taraba.
Some of the victims told NAN that the situation is worse now with the current heat as snakes leave their holes in search of fresh air and food.
“The nights are often more traumatising. You are left outside in the dark, and a reptile may just creep through your legs.
“While I was in captivity, snakes bit some victims. The kidnappers were not spared as some of them also got bitten,” a victim, who was taken to a thick forest in Kagara, in Niger, said.
According to him, in Kagara forest, the snakes are so common that the locals refer to them as “kadangarun Kagara (Kagara lizards).”
