Police continue hunt for abductors

National, Normal
Source:

The National, Tuesday August 07th, 2012

POLICE are still searching for the kidnappers of Sobi Roa, the 14-year-old son of Enga provincial returning officer Cleapas Roa, police said yesterday.
Provincial police commander Supt Martin Lakari said the Wabag Primary School student, who was kidnapped last Monday in Wabag town, Enga, and then released last Friday, had given a statement to police about his ordeal.
The boy had been held captive for five days in the Lower Lai area of Wapenamanda district before being released unhurt.
He was forced to call his father and tell him to stop vote counting for the Enga regional seat or he (Sobi) would be killed.
Sobi was taken to Kuimamanda village, near the Wapenamanda district headquarters at 3am last Friday where one of the captors gave him a mobile phone to call his father, Cleapas, who then drove and picked him up some hours later.
Lakari said in Wabag on Sunday great pressure from police on the regional candidates resulted in the release of the boy who was unharmed.
Lakari said Sobi’s release would not stop police investigation.
He said a couple had lured the teenager into a waiting vehicle on the Premiers Hill. The couple and others involved were known to police.
He said the Criminal Investigation officers interviewed Sobi last Saturday.
Lakari said a couple who lived near Keas village, Wabag, near Premiers Hill where Sobi lived, had gone into hiding.
He said the couple told the boy to jump into a waiting five-door Toyota Land Cruiser to go for a ride and would return at around 4pm.
He said the driver of the vehicle drove them to Mambis Centre in Wapenamanda, and changed vehicles there, before driving to Lower Lai in a different Land Cruiser.
He said the boy was left with a woman from Kompiam, who was married in the area.
He said that during the early hours of last Friday morning, his captors returned, picked up the boy and drove him to Kuimamanda village and left him there, where his father later picked him up.
Lakari said it was the first of its kind in PNG in relation to the national election.
He said Enga police would not rest until those involved in the kidnapping and death threats faced justice.
He said it was a very serious criminal matter and appealed to the people involved to surrender to police.