Bandits Kill 29 People in Borno Villages for Informing Army on Operation

Suspected members of Boko Haram Islamic sect last Monday attacked two Borno State villages killing 29 persons.

In the deadlier of the two attacks, the terrorist group attacked Ngamgam in Mobbar Local Government Area of the state killing 20 farmers.

Ngamgam is about 50 kilometres east of Damasak, the Secretariat of Mobbar, which has border with Niger Republic, another country in the Lake Chad Basin troubled by Boko Haram and its sister organisation, Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP).

Sources told the media that the attack was a punishment on the people of the village for allegedly leaking information on their operations to the military.

The source said: “The terrorists stormed the settlement in about five pickup vans and motorcycles, first accusing the villagers of divulging information on their operations to the military, thereby taking side with the military in the ongoing war against them.”

He added: “They (Boko Haram) told the villagers pointblank that that was why they had come to punish them; and they immediately picked out many for slaughter and shot others, the total of the people killed was 20.”

The source also revealed that “the insurgents are used to carrying out serial killings of people in the border villages, but this time, they decided on a mass killing of villagers mainly for the offence of allegedly divulging information to the military on their operations.

 “The insurgents impose taxes on the residents of all the villages as well as enslave them, especially to farm for them; so this massive killing of the Ngangam farmers could also have been intended by the insurgents as a stern warning to the residents of the agrarian settlements to, as the rainy season sets in, prepare to farm for them or face the consequences.”

He said the killing led to mass exodus of people from the village into Damasak.

In the second attack last Monday, the Boko Haram terrorists were alleged to have attack a village in Guzamala Local Government Area of the troubled state, the birthplace of Boko Haram, killing nine persons and carting away their food and livestock.

A chieftain of the Civilian Joint Task Force in the state, Abba-Aji Kalli, told journalists on the phone that men of the vigilance group phoned to inform them in Maiduguri that the insurgents attacked Kaula in Guzamala council area and killed nine persons.