Abducted UNTH doctor escapes as kidnappers fall into deep sleep after smoking weed

An abducted resident doctor attached to the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, UNTH, Ituku-Ozalla, Enugu State, Dr. Orockarrah Orock, has escaped from kidnappers’ den. 

It was gathered that Orock, who is attached to the Anaesthesia Department of the UNTH was kidnapped on Saturday night, November 4, 2023, within the hospital premises, while on call duty.

The Chairman of the Nigeria Medical Association, NMA, Enugu State Chapter, Dr Celestine Ugwoke, confirmed the development to the News Agency of Nigeria in Enugu on Monday, November 6. 

Mr. Ugwoke said that Orock miraculously escaped after the kidnappers felt satisfied with his wife’s offer to pay the ransom they demanded and went to have a “nice time with their weeds and spirits and fell into a deep sleep”

According to him, the abducted doctor gradually crawled away from the spot he was kept in the kidnappers’ den and later trekked and ran a distance before sighting human activities and then came out near the Four Corner Junction of Enugu-Port Harcourt Expressway.

“He called his wife and the wife called the UNTH chief security officer who picked him up at midnight on Saturday. We are profoundly grateful to God for his miraculous escape,” he said.

The chairman, however, said that doctors had become endangered professionals in the state, as kidnappers always target them especially those working in tertiary health institutions in the state.

“We are really in trouble as doctors are now their target and we are living in fear as the kidnappers now chase us as if they are chasing rats,” he said.

The chairman said that any more abduction of any doctor in UNTH again, doctors in the teaching hospital would totally down tools adding that this warning would be extended to other tertiary hospitals in the state.

Mr. Ugwoke said that the association would be meeting with the Chief Medical Director, CMD, of UNTH to mandate to release of security protocol for the hospital, to ensure the safety of all doctors, management staff, staff and patients in the hospital.

“We also want the hospital management to beef up security within the hospital, ensure adequate perimeter fencing of the entire hospital and installation of Close Circuit Television Camera (CCTV) and its monitoring base within the hospital.

“As an association, we have previously met the state’s Commissioner for Health and the Commissioner of Police on the spate of insecurity our members face even in the discharge of their life-saving professional duties.

“All efforts through official letters and other means to pay a courtesy call on Gov. Peter Mbah and intimate him on the vital issue of doctors’ security in the state had proved abortive.

“Maybe, the government wants doctors to leave their duty posts and carry placards to the Enugu Government House before listening to us. This will be very bad, if allowed to drag to this point,” he said.