Sopuruchi Onwuka

It was a tale of hopeless tragedy in the Kuchi community in Niger State weekend when gunmen launched twin attacks unchallenged and spent several hours pillaging the villagers and kidnapping some 160 of them. The incident happened in Munya local government area of the state.

Local sources told newsmen that the gunmen who stormed the village on Friday evening also returned on Sunday evening to finish up the job.

According to different accounts of the story reaching The Oracle Today, the first set of gunmen who arrived Friday evening operated till late Saturday. Then another set arrived on Sunday to finish up.

The hoodlums had a field day after killing off spirited hunters and residents who attempted resistance. And there were no countermeasures from even when security forces in Niger State had been alerted.

The gunmen, according to local sources, attacked Kuchi community first on Friday evening, killed those who tried to fight back and kidnapped a large number of residents including women and children.  Three other residents were injured.

They also returned on Sunday night for widespread looting of livestock and food, burning several shops in the process and forcing about 700 villagers to flee town.

Most of the victims are women, children and the elderly, including the head of the village and his two wives.

An official of Munya local government area of the state, Aminu Abdulhamid Najume, narrated that local residents and vigilante forces that responded to the distress call immediately dispersed after 10 of them were killed by the bandits who are said to have carried flags and insignia of Boko Haram sect of the ISWA. 

In display of audacity, the gunmen took time to raid the village for several hours in the cold rainy evening, fighting cold and hunger by cooking part of the stolen spaghetti, noodles and tea.

“They moved from house to house abducting people,” Aminu told newsmen who contacted him on phone. He added that the police visited Kuchi after the second attack on Sunday and left without any commitment to secure the abducted villagers.

Villagers who narrated their different ordeals during the attack details how they escaped and how their vulnerable relations including wives, sisters and aunts were herded away by the bandits. Others narrated how their family members disguised among livestock to escape notice of the invaders.

“I left behind my wife, children and elderly parents. The invaders captured my wife and her elder sister but my wife later managed to escape from them while they were ferrying the hostages across the Shiroro River,” narrated a resident who escaped the attack on his motorbike.

Another resident narrated how his children and parents “ran into our goat house and hid among the animals there.” the anonymous Kuchi resident said.

Spokesman of the Armey respectively was unavailable to speak on the attack.

Several communities in the state have earlier been attacked in recent months by armed gangs killing residents or kidnapping them for ransom.

 In April, six soldiers were killed in an ambush in the region, while responding to a distress call.

In an act of desperation the Kuchi community had recently hired local hunters as vigilantes for protection, Mr Najume said.

Niger state’s security commissioner, Muhammed Bello, said his department, along with various security agencies, was investigating the abduction.

In a declaration on X, the Amnesty International criticized the government for leaving “rural communities at the mercy of gunmen.” It pointed out that gunmen have been consistently attacking Kuchi village and raping women and girls in their matrimonial homes since 2021.

“The invasion of the village by the gunmen is yet another indication of the Nigerian authorities’ utter failure to protect lives,” Amnesty added.

The Kuchi abduction comes two months after 21 people, including a newlywed, were killed when gunmen described locally as ‘bandits’ stormed a market in Rafi, another affected district in Niger.

At least 137 schoolchildren were kidnapped earlier in March in Niger’s neighboring Kaduna state but were later released after the kidnappers made an initial demand of 1 billion naira (over $675,000) and threatened to kill them all if their demands were not met.