killed while property worth millions of Naira
were destroyed yesterday in Benue Gombe
and Kogi states.
In Benue State, 50 lives were lost in a
renewed attack on Tiv community in Guma
Local Government of the state by
suspected Fulani herdsmen. The Fulani/Tiv
crisis was reportedly spreading towards
Makurdi, Benue State capital yesterday, with
refugees fleeing the war zone and
streaming into the metropolis.
This came as eight persons died on the
Lokoja-Abuja road yesterday.
Vanguard gathered the areas hardest hit by
the renewed attack in Benue State include
Tiv settlements at Dooga, Kpata, Lokobi
Ajimaka, Ekeae, Giza, Yogbo and
Mbagwem communities.
Those fleeing from the area with their
wives and children from Kpata village, said
the number of the dead could exceed 50
stressing that as many as 350 persons
were yet to be accounted for.
Mr. Tyopine Agar who fled from one of the
communities told Vangurd: “Many of our
people were in the farms when the crisis
erupted and till now no one knows their
whereabouts.”
Agar said the Fulani herdsmen who were
assisted by the people residing on the
border of Benue and Nasarawa states in
Doma town laid siege on their villages,
shooting and burning both their houses
and property.
Moved by the level of devastation in the
communities, the Speaker of the Benue
House of Assembly, Mr. Dave Iyorhemba,
who paid an unscheduled visit to some of
the refugees now camped at the Local
Government Education Authority, LGEA,
Primary School, Kadroko, lamented the
recurrent attack on the Tiv communities by
herdsmen.
Iyorhemba who asked the people to
remain calm, regretted the insensitivity of
the Nasarawa State Government to the
plight of the victims and urged both the
Benue and Nasarawa governments to take
decisive steps to check the further carnage
in the affected communities.
He also implored the two states to
implement recommendations of the peace
committee they had earlier set up by
releasing a white paper on findings of the
panel set up in June to investigate the
immediate and remote causes of the
recurrent crisis.
He said: “Aside being the Speaker of the
Benue State House of Assembly, the people
affected in these skirmishes are my
constituents and Tiv communities affected
in Nasarawa State have contributed in no
small measure to the socio-economic
development of the state and therefore
deserve the protection of that state
government. What is happening is rather
unfortunate and heart rendering. On the
part of the Benue State government we
have already started releasing relief
materials to the displaced people but
unfortunately no such assistance is coming
from the Nasarawa State government.”
He called on the National Emergency
Management Agency to move in with relief
materials to thousands of displaced
persons.
The Village Head of Dooga, one of the
ravaged villages, Zaki Tsashaku, lamented
the level of devastation in the community
just as he urged the Benue and Nasarawa
state governments to jointly deploy
security personnel to the affected
communities before the crises would
spread o major towns in both states.
Meanwhile, no fewer than 10 persons lost
their lives while several others sustained
serious injuries in an auto crash at Bagali
village, along Bauchi – Gombe road.
An eyewitness whose name could not be
immediately known said the accident
happened when a truck with number plate
XA491 DAS over-took another vehicle at a
bend and crashed into three Vectra Opel
cars killing 10 persons instantly.
The truck driver and other passengers
sustained various degrees of injuries and
were evacuated to a hospital by officials of
the Federal Road Safety Commission, FRSC.
An official of FRSC who pleaded anonymity
confirmed the story adding that 10 persons
died while those injured are being treated at
the Bauchi General Hospital.
He attributed the accident to wrong over -
taking, saying the corpses were deposited
at the Bauchi General Hospital Mortuary.
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