A social media post outlining detailed survival advice for Nigerians who may be kidnapped by bandits while travelling has gone viral, drawing widespread attention to the grim reality that citizens now require practical guidelines for navigating abduction. The post, which circulated across multiple platforms, advises travellers on how to behave when captured, how to handle their mobile phones, and how the contents of those phones can directly determine whether a ransom demand is high or low.
The advisory is structured as a step-by-step guide. It begins with the most basic instruction, do not argue with someone holding an AK-47, and moves into specifics that reveal a disturbing level of familiarity with how kidnapping operations work in Nigeria today. The post warns that a victim’s mobile phone is one of the most critical factors in determining the outcome of a kidnapping. Bandits reportedly use the phone to assess a victim’s financial standing based on bank alerts, screenshots, social media profiles, and stored images. The advice is blunt. Either discard the phone before reaching the forest or leave it behind in the vehicle.
The post goes further, explaining what happens if a victim arrives in captivity with a phone still in their possession. At that point, bandits will demand that the victim call a family member to begin ransom negotiations. The advisory presents two paths. If the victim has someone who can pay, they should provide a contact number and allow the process to unfold. If the victim has no one capable of paying, they are told to refuse to give any number and insist they cannot remember one. The post acknowledges that this path leads to suffering but maintains that bandits will eventually release victims who have no financial value to them. In some cases, the ransom of a victim without family contacts is reportedly added to the bill of other captives whose families are already negotiating.
The post also included a set of precautions that read less like security advice and more like a commentary on daily life in Nigeria.
“A phone is not just a communication tool anymore. It can become evidence used against you. So use your phone wisely, travel carefully, and always think about your safety first,” the post stated.
Among the precautions listed were recommendations to avoid storing displays of wealth on phones, to lock sensitive apps with passwords, to delete bank alerts and financial screenshots, and to be cautious about social media posts. The underlying message was clear. In today’s Nigeria, what you carry in your pocket can be just as dangerous as where you travel.
The post reflects a country where kidnapping has become so routine that ordinary citizens are developing and sharing their own survival protocols. Banditry and abduction along major highways in the north and increasingly across other regions have forced Nigerians into a reality where preparing for the possibility of being taken is now part of travel planning. That this kind of advice circulates not as satire but as genuine, practical guidance speaks volumes about the depth of the security crisis.
Here’s The Main Article:
If you are attacked and kidnapped by bandits along the road as travellers, please:
1. Don’t argue with someone with an AK-47 in his hand, comply and follow them.
2. Don’t follow them with your phone, is either throw it away or leave it inside the bus or car because the phone will determine the high or low ransom.
3. If the bandits do not get your mobile phone when you reach the forest, you have two options to perform:
a. The bandits will ask you to call any of your family members you know their phone no, and if you know that you have money to pay for the ransom, or if someone can pay for your ransom, please give them the phone no to call and start negotiating till they release you
b. If you know that you don’t have money or anyone to pay for your ransom, please don’t give them any phone no, stand your ground that you can’t remember any phone no. You will go through hell but stand your ground, the bandits will later release you but you will go through hell.
4. Remember that if they collect your phone after your release, the phone will not be given back to you, so it’s better for you to throw it away or leave it inside the car.
5. If you refuse to give them your family member’s phone no to call for ransom, sometimes, they would add your own ransom to those victims who call their family to pay for your ransom because you have no family to pay on your behalf.
Important precautions:
1. Avoid posting or storing too many displays of wealth on your phone.
2. Lock sensitive apps with passwords.
3. Remove unnecessary bank alerts or sensitive screenshots.
4. Be careful about what you post on social media.
5. Avoid saving sensitive financial information openly in your phone.
Leave a Reply