By Cross Udo, with additional report
As of yesterday evening, the death in the fresh attack on the Zike community, Kimakpa, Kwall district of Bassa Local Government Area of Plateau State, has hit 51, with several houses razed.
The attack is coming less than two weeks after fifty-two persons were killed in some communities in the state.
According to a Kwall community leader, Wakili Tongwe, the attackers invaded the village in the early hours of yesterday. They shot sporadically at residents who were scampering for safety after hearing gunshots.
The community leader told Channels Television on the phone that a team of vigilantes, including himself and some security personnel, were on patrol in another community when the attackers invaded the village and started shooting.
Though the security personnel engaged the invaders and succeeded in repelling the attackers, the damage had been done, with about thirty-six persons shot dead and four others dying later.
Some other residents sustained gunshot wounds and are receiving medical attention at the hospital.
Security agencies in the state are yet to comment on the attack, which is coming less than two weeks after fifty-two persons were killed in some communities of the Bokkos Local Government Area of the North-Central state.
*Enough is enough; end killings now, Tinubu tells Mutfwang
Meanwhile, President Bola Tinubu has given marching orders to the Plateau State Governor, Caleb Mutfwang, to summon the necessary political will to resolve the crisis and establish enduring peace.
The President has also expressed profound sorrow over the recent bloodshed in the state, a tragedy that has claimed the lives of over 50 individuals.
A statement issued by the presidential spokesman, Bayo Onanuga, stated that President Tinubu, who strongly condemned the violence, extended his sympathies to Governor Mutfwang, the state government, and the people of Plateau.
In his call for harmony among the people of Plateau State, President Tinubu emphasised the importance of love and unity beyond religious and ethnic lines.
He encouraged community, spiritual, and political leaders within and beyond the state to unite and end the cycle of retaliatory attacks that have made life unbearable for affected communities.
The statement quoted Tinubu as saying, “The ongoing violence between communities in Plateau State, rooted in misunderstandings between different ethnic and religious groups, must cease,” President Tinubu asserts.
“I have instructed security agencies to thoroughly investigate this crisis and identify those responsible for orchestrating these violent acts. We cannot allow this devastation and the tit-for-tat attacks to continue. Enough is enough.
“Beyond dealing with the criminal elements of these incessant killings, the political leadership in Plateau State, led by Governor Caleb Mutfwang, must address the root cause of this age-long problem. These problems have been with us for more than two decades.
“We can no longer ignore the underlying issues. It is time to tackle them fairly and find a lasting solution. I have discussed these problems with the Governor over time and offered suggestions for lasting peace.
“The Federal Government remains committed to supporting Governor Mutfwang and the Plateau State government in promoting dialogue, fostering social cohesion, and ensuring accountability—crucial steps towards permanently resolving the conflict in Plateau.”
Also, the former Military Governor of Plateau State, Rear Admiral Bitrus Atukum (retd), has called on the Federal Government and the security agencies to find lasting solutions to the incessant killings in the state.
Atukum, who governed Plateau between January 1984 and August 1985, made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Jos.
The retired senior military officer was reacting to the recent killings in Bokkos and Bassa Local Government Areas (LGAs) of the state.
Atukum, who decried the wanton destruction of houses, farmlands and other properties, alleged that the attacks were geared towards land grabbing and economic sabotage.
He called on President Bola Tinubu to give specific instructions to the military on handling the current security challenges in the Plateau and beyond.
“These attacks are majorly aimed at land grabbing and ensuring that the people of Plateau remain hungry and poor.
“The attackers have been using the 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 clash in somebody’s bedroom? These people go into people’s bedrooms in the villages.
“These people come down from the hills, commit havoc and disappear, and that is where they hide their weapons.
“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 killing in our communities,” he said.
The former Governor decried that the ongoing attacks were also aimed at depriving the locals of farming, their principal occupation, thereby subjecting them to hunger and poverty.
“We are now in the farming season, and we won’t have a 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 the brunt of these killings.
“It will be worse if nothing is done. That is why we must speak out at all levels against this evil,” he said.
Atukum called on the residents of Plateau to defend themselves and warned them not to take laws into their own hands.
Plateau State has, for several decades, been a hotbed of killings, with gunmen sacking entire communities.
About 200 people were killed at Christmas 2023 celebrations during a bloody attack on a majority Christian community. In May last year, around 40 people were killed and homes torched in the town of Wase.
Experts blame the fight for resources between farmers and herders as a significant cause of the attacks.
But the state governor, Caleb Muftwang, says there was more to the attacks.
“I can tell you, in all honesty, that I cannot find any explanation other than genocide sponsored by terrorists. The question is, who are the persons behind the organisers of this terrorism? The governor said this is what the security agencies must help us unravel,” the governor said in a recent edition of Channels Television’s Politics Today.
He said bandits have taken over 64 communities in the state.
