A three-year-old Nigerian boy was kidnapped in the oil-producing Niger Delta in southern Nigeria today, police said, four days after a British girl of the same age was released by her kidnappers.
Police spokeswoman Ireju Barasua said the boy was snatched while he was being taken to school by the family driver in the morning. The kidnappers blocked the car with their own and seized the toddler, leaving the driver behind.
Ms Barasua said the boy, whom she named as Francis Samuel Amadi, was the son of a traditional ruler in the community of Iriebe, on the outskirts of Port Harcourt, the delta's main city. She gave the father's name as Eze Francis Amadi.
Kidnappings for ransom are common in the Niger Delta but until recently it was rare for children to be seized. This is the third child abduction since the start of June.
On Sunday night, unknown ransom seekers released three-year-old Margaret Hill unharmed after four days in captivity. Gunmen had snatched the toddler on July 5th from the car in which she was being driven to school in Port Harcourt.
The girl's family and authorities in Rivers state, where Port Harcourt is located, said no money had been paid.
In June, the three-year-old son of a member of the Rivers state House of Assembly was also kidnapped. Nigerian newspapers reported that a ransom had been paid to obtain his release.
The child abductions have caused outrage in Nigeria. President Umaru Yar'Adua said last week that no political or economic grievance could justify the kidnapping of a child.
He was referring to a violent political crisis in the delta, which accounts for all of Nigeria's oil wealth but has suffered neglect and pollution during five decades of oil extraction.
Some rebel groups have kidnapped oil workers and attacked oil facilities in an increasingly violent campaign for "resource control", or local power over oil wealth. Nigeria's oil output is down by over 20 percent because of these attacks.
But many criminal gangs have used the struggle for resource control as a cover for lucrative activities such as abductions for ransom and "bunkering", or smuggling crude oil stolen from pipelines and barges.
The government as well as the political armed groups all condemn the "commercialisation" of hostage taking.
About 200 expatriates have been seized in the Niger Delta since the start of 2006 and most of them have been released unharmed in exchange for money.
At least 11 foreign hostages are still being held by various armed groups in the delta.