‘My 82-Year-Old Mother Was Kidnapped For 5 Days Because I Didn’t Give Money To Oil Marketers’ – Okonjo-Iweala

Former Finance minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has revealed the challenges and ordeals she faced while in office all in a bid to fight corruption. She narrated how angry oil marketers vowed she would be made to leave office in a wheelchair because she was fighting against the abuse of oil subsidy.

In an interview with BBC News Africa, Okonjo-Iweala, said the same angry oil marketers planned her  82-year-old mother’s abduction in December 2012 and that when the kidnappers contacted her, they did not ask for money as was widely thought but rather demanded that she should go to television, announce her resignation and also pay oil marketers their money.

”She was held for five days. I got a call. They didn’t ask for money, contrary to what people thought. They told me to go to the Television and radio and publicly resign and go back to the US where I was working before. This was shocking. When my mother asked the four young men why they abducted her, the kidnappers said because your daughter did not pay oil marketers their money and that is how we found out it had to do with oil marketers”she said