Security operatives in Imo State have located a suspected hideout where 19 prospective National Youth Service Corps members abducted along the Owerri-Onitsha Road are believed to be held, but an immediate rescue operation has been put on hold because of fears that the area may have been booby-trapped.

The state Commissioner of Police, Audu Garba Bosso, disclosed the development on Saturday while providing an update on the ongoing operation to rescue the victims.

According to Bosso, security personnel followed the kidnappers into the bush on Friday before deploying drones to identify their precise location. The aerial surveillance reportedly confirmed the coordinates of the suspected camp.

The commissioner explained that security forces had refrained from advancing directly into the location because intelligence reports suggested that explosives had been planted around the camp.

He said the agencies were instead preparing specialised equipment and armoured vehicles to enable them approach the location while reducing the danger to both the hostages and the rescuers.

The victims were reportedly travelling in two buses from Ibadan, Oyo State, to NYSC orientation camps in Abia and Akwa Ibom when gunmen attacked them around Umunoha on the Owerri-Onitsha Road on Thursday.

Isiah Akpan, managing director of Uko Akwa Ibom Motors Nigeria Limited, previously disclosed that 19 passengers, all prospective corps members, were taken into the bush after the attack. The drivers reportedly escaped and alerted security personnel at a nearby checkpoint.

The abductors are said to have demanded N50m for each victim, putting the reported ransom demand at N950m. Some families have also reportedly been contacted through the phones of their relatives, while one family said it saw some of the captives during a video call.

The police had earlier announced that 10 people were rescued during the operation, although the command’s spokesperson, Henry Okoye, said he could not immediately establish whether those rescued were part of the abducted prospective corps members.

With the suspected location now identified, security agencies are preparing for a carefully coordinated operation aimed at reaching the captives without triggering explosives believed to have been planted around the hideout.