The National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), in collaboration with the Department of State Services (DSS), has arrested a female truck driver, Hasana Jacob, and six others for allegedly stealing and trafficking children across Nigeria.
The NAPTIP’s Press Officer, Vincent Adekoye, made it known in a statement this Tuesday saying that the agency revealed that Jacob, a 33-year-old truck driver from Plateau State, worked as an alternate driver for a well-known cement company in Obajana, Kogi State.
She was apprehended in Abuja alongside six suspected gang members—Aisha Suleiman, Murtala Tanimu, Shamsu Tanimu, Adamu Jacob, Abubakar Ahmed, and Ali Muhammed—while attempting to sell a three-year-old girl stolen from Damaturu, Yobe State.
Investigations revealed that Jacob led an organized human trafficking syndicate that specialized in abducting children aged one and above, selling them for N600,000 each.
Using her job as a truck driver as a cover, she allegedly kidnapped children from truck terminals across Nigeria, bypassed security checkpoints, and delivered them to buyers without suspicion.
According to NAPTIP, the syndicate operated with designated roles, including luring victims, coordinating sales, and arranging buyers even before the children arrived.
NAPTIP’s Director General, Binta Adamu Bello, OON, condemned the crime, calling it “an unimaginable act of wickedness.” She commended the DSS for their role in the arrest and urged law enforcement agencies to strengthen their collaboration in fighting human trafficking.
“I am deeply saddened by this latest arrest. It is painful that human beings would form a criminal gang, use a company-branded vehicle, move from one part of the country to another, steal children from families, and sell them to unknown buyers. This causes everlasting sorrow to the affected families while traffickers profit from their pain,” Bello said.
She further expressed shock that the ringleader of the syndicate was a woman, emphasizing the irony of a mother inflicting such suffering on other families.
Meanwhile, NAPTIP has impounded the 22-tyre cement truck used in the trafficking operation, and investigations are ongoing.