From Yakubu Buhari, Jos
Over forty people have reportedly been killed in an attack on Zike, Kimakpa community, in Kwall District of Irigwe Chiefdom in Bassa local government area of Plateau State.
This incident is coming less than a week after over 60 people were gruesomely massacred in communities in the Bokkos local council. On Saturday, a father and two sons were also killed in the area.
The National Secretary of the Irigwe Development Association, Danjuma Dickson Auta, said the attacks, which occurred around 8:00 p.m. on Sunday, left 47 dead and several others severely injured.l
Acting Coordinator of Operation Rainbow, a state-owned security outfit, Brig.-Gen. Gakji Shipi, who doubles as the Special Adviser on Internal Security to Gov. Caleb Mutfwang, confirmed the incident.
“It is unfortunate; this is really a major setback to the peace process in the state. Government and security agencies are on top of the situation, and we will soon nip this ugly incidents in the bud”, he said.
The State government expressed deep concern over the incessant killings in the state and the alleged occupation of communities by bandits, a situation that continues to fuel tensions across the middle belt region.
Meanwhile, the former military Governor of Plateau, Retired Rear Admiral Bitrus Atukum, has called on the Federal Government and security agencies to find lasting solution to the incessant killings in the state.
Atukum, who governed Plateau between January 1984 and August 1985, decried the wanton destruction of houses, farmlands and other properties.
Alleged that the attacks were geared towards land grabbing and economic sabotage, Atukum called on President Bola Tinubu and security agencies to fish the perpetrators out.
“These attacks are majorly aimed at land grabbing and ensuring that the people of Plateau remain hungry and poor. The attackers have been using same pattern; attack, kill, chase people away and later on take over their houses and lands.
“In the past, they deceived us with harder-farmer clashes, but how can you have a clash in somebody’s bedroom? These people go into people’s bedroom in the villages. These people come down from the hills, commit havoc and disappear, and that is where they hide their weapons.
“We are now in the farming season and we won’t have sufficient number of farmers that will be farming on their lands. Of course, that will lead to perpetual hunger and poverty; the ordinary man is presently bearing all this brunt of these killings. It will be worse if nothing is done. That is why we have to speak out at all levels against this evil.
“So, I call on the President to order the army to go and fish them out from their hiding places. That’s the only way to end this mindless killings in our communities”, he said.
