Armed bandits on Saturday evening abducted nineteen people including three nursing mothers with their one-week-old babies in Zurmi Local Government Areas of Zamfara state.
The abduction came barely 48 hours after more than 40 people were kidnapped from Kanwa village in the same Local Government Area.
A lull had prevailed after years of deadly attacks on communities in the local government. But, in recent times, abductions and pockets of assaults have resurfaced making the residents become jittery once again.
The mass abduction is believed to be perpetrated by a notorious bandit leader called Dankarami, who is known to have been terrorizing residents in Zurmi – Birnin Magaji – Jibia axis in Zamfara and the neighbouring Katsina State.
“We were observing Isha prayer when suddenly we started to hear heavy gunfire from every angle of the community. We rushed out of the mosque and learnt that we were under siege by the armed criminals. Since it was dark, some of us managed to escape the assault. The armed men went house to house picking whoever they could find including nursing mothers and children.
“Some of the residents who hid inside the surrounding bushes have started to come back to their residences. We are pleading with authorities to extend the military operations to our communities. More than ninety per cent of our farmlands remained uncultivated for fear of abduction or killing,” one of the community leaders said.
