Reverend Polycap Zango, a pastor with the Church of Christ in Nations, Jos, Plateau State, who went missing while traveling to Gombe State for a conference, has appeared in a new video saying he was abducted by the Islamic State West Africa Province.
Zango said he was in the custody of the insurgents alongside two other Christian women, who were also abducted.
In the video, the cleric is seen seated behind a prayer mat and says he was abducted on Monday, October 2020.
He said, “My name is Reverend Polycap Zango and I am a pastor at COCIN LCC Wild Life Park, Plateau State, Nigeria.
“On October 19, 2020, I was traveling for a conference in Gombe when I was abducted by Boko Haram insurgents who caught me on the road.
“Right now I am with them.
“I am appealing to the governor of Plateau State, Simon Boko Lalong, and the senator of Plateau North, Barrister ID Gyang, and the Christian Association of Nigeria and COCIN to please help save me from their hands.
“They also abducted two Christian women who are also here with me, we are appealing to be rescued.”
It is not clear if Miss Fayina Ali, a Kaduna-indigene of Adamawa State, who was also said to have gone missing the same Monday he was captured, is among the two Zongo mentioned.
Miss Ali had held her marriage introduction on the weekend of her disappearance with her wedding with an Air Force personnel slated for December 2020.
She was reported to have been captured along with four other ladies by Boko Haram but no clear information has been received about them
In what is being noted as a systematic direct war against Christianity in Nigeria, Pastors, Christian Leaders, and Seminarians are either being kidnapped or killed every week.
Christians in Nigeria have been the target of many attacks by the vicious Boko Haram jihadist Islamist terrorists, herdsmen attacks and many other kidnappings in recent times.
Nigeria ranks as the 12th worst country in the world on Open Doors USA’s 2020 World Watch List of countries where Christians are most severely persecuted. Nigeria was in December, listed in the U.S. State Department’s special watch list of countries that tolerate or engage in severe violations of religious freedom due to the “lack of effective government response and the lack of judicial cases being brought forward in that country”.
An earlier report last month, revealed that around 620 Christians were killed in the African country by Islamic militants during the first five months of 2020 alone