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Olabode Adaramola, Niger State
The District Heads of Allawa and Matan, in Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, have called on the state government, to as a matter of urgency, addressed the persistent attacks by armed bandits on communities in Shiroro and Rafi Local Government Areas of the state.
They made the appeal shortly after meeting with the Secretary to the Niger State Government(SSG) Alhaji Ahmed Ibrahim Matane at the Government House in Minna the state capital on Wednesday.
Communities in Shiroro and Rafi have been witnessing series of attacks by armed bandits suspected to have been fleeing from Zamfara and Kaduna states axis, where many lives have been lost and thousands of people were either injured or displaced from their communities.
The Village Head of Magami, Alhaji Sani Yakubu , said that the bandits attacked Kokoki, Galadima-gogo, Kurebe, Kasha, Bassa and Madaka communities in Matan and Allawa district areas of Shiroro and Rafi local government areas.
He explained that the activities of bandits had led to the death of no fewer than nine people, while three others were injured just as several women and teenage girls were raped by the fleeing bandits.
“The bandits started operation last week, they came in large numbers with AK 47 riffles and attacked our ranfomly for about four days, they killed our people, stole our monies,other valuables, raped our women and teenage girls and kidnapped six children.
” We paid a ransome of about N2 million, bought them recharge cards worth N20,000 and gave them peak milk after which five out of the six children were released.
“They didn’t end there, they came back again, rustled 3,000 cattle, followed from house to house and stole about N10 million from us as well as our belongings such as motorcycles, ” he said.
Yakubu further explained that the continuous bandits attacks forced him and his six wives to abandon his throne to seek shelter in the bush.
Similarly, Alhaji Mohammed Labaran, District Head of Matan, disclosed that during the event of the attacks, there was no presence of security personnel in the affected communities.
He appealed to the state government to deploy security personnel to Magandan,, saying that “the influx of armed bandits into the state were from the routes leading to Zamfara, Kaduna and Niger states .
Responding, the SSG, Ahmed Ibrahim Matane, said that government had deployed security personnel to the areas with the view to curtail the situation, bring the situation under control and appealed to the members of the communities to cooperate with the security personnel.
