{{Officials in Nigeria say the mother of the Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has been kidnapped.}}<\/p>\n
Professor Kamene Okonjo was taken from her home in Delta State on Sunday.<\/p>\n
A finance ministry statement said Mrs Okonjo-Iweala had been threatened recently but did not know whether this was linked to the kidnapping.<\/p>\n
Nigeria is one of the worst countries in the world for kidnapping, where it is a lucrative criminal enterprise worth millions of dollars a year.<\/p>\n
The crime is particularly prevalent in the oil-rich Delta State, although high-profile victims are uncommon.<\/p>\n
A security official said it was not clear whether the motive was political or pecuniary.<\/p>\n
Mrs Okonjo-Iweala has led a high-profile campaign to clean up corruption in Nigeria, particularly in a controversial fuel subsidy programme.<\/p>\n
Leading candidate<\/p>\n
She has delayed the payment to fuel importers, seeking better verification of claims for subsidies<\/p>\n
But analysts say kidnapping for political reasons is rare in Nigeria.<\/p>\n
A Finance Ministry statement added, “This is obviously a very difficult time for the entire Okonjo family. But the family is hopeful of a positive outcome as it fervently prays for the quick and safe return of the matriarch.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{Officials in Nigeria say the mother of the Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has been kidnapped.}} Professor Kamene Okonjo was taken from her home in Delta State on Sunday. A finance ministry statement said Mrs Okonjo-Iweala had been threatened recently but did not know whether this was linked to the kidnapping. Nigeria is one of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[100],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-4552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-africa","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=4552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}