By Emperor Simon At least 19 people have been kidnapped by gunmen in Ogu and Tegina communities in Rafi Local Government Area (LGA) of...
By Emperor Simon
At least 19 people have been kidnapped by gunmen in Ogu and
Tegina communities in Rafi Local Government Area (LGA) of Niger State.
The Chief of Staff to Rafi LGA Chairman, Mohammed Mohammed,
confirmed the incident to Channels Television on Monday.
He, however, had to place telephone calls to some residents
of the affected communities for more information.
Efforts to reach the police authorities to confirm the
incident proved abortive as the Police Public Relations Officer in Niger, Wasiu
Abiodun, did not pick his calls or respond to messages sent to him.
A resident of Ogu, Kamal Wayam, decried that the attackers
stormed the community on Sunday morning and started shooting into the air.
“The gunmen in their large number arrived in Ogu on
motorcycles and before we knew what was happening, they started shooting into
the air.
“They ransacked people’s houses and whatever valuable they
could lay their hands on, they carted away,” Wayam said during his conversation
with Mohammed.
He added, “They also abducted six persons from Ogu. Four of
the persons abducted were members of one family while the other two were
visitors to the community.”
Ogu is a settlement close to Wayam, another community about
two kilometres from Kagara, the headquarters of Rafi LGA.
Similarly, the attack on Tegina community was said to have
happened at about 12:30am on Monday with 16 people abducted.
“The gunmen entered the room of my daughter that night, but
she hid herself under the bed, while her husband went up the ceiling,” Sani Gamachindo,
a resident of the community, told Mohammed,
He added, “When the gunmen entered their room, they spent
like 30 minutes and ate almost all the food in the kitchen. Thank God they were
not abducted, but 16 persons were kidnapped.”
The latest attacks in Rafi LGA came barely four days after
gunmen abducted a youth leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), the
District Head of Gunna, and two children of two health workers in Garin Gabbas
and Yakila communities in the local government.
Elsewhere, a pastor with the Evangelical Church Winning All
(ECWA), Jeremiah Ibrahim, was killed by gunmen in Chukuba community in Shiroro
LGA.
The clergyman who was serving at the branch of the church in
Kuta was murdered on Friday last week.
A senior official of the church in Minna, who pleaded
anonymity, said Pastor Ibrahim had gone to check his farm in Chukuba and
decided to visit a colleague who was the resident pastor of Chukuba where he
was attacked and killed.
“This is coming barely two weeks after six missionaries of
ECWA and the wife of one of them were abducted,” he added.
He stated that the clergyman has since been buried.
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