Around 5.30 p.m. on Saturday evening terrorists wielding Ak47 rifles and riding on motorcycles invaded Ruwan Tofa community in Dansadau Maru Local Government Area of Zamfara State, killed 26 persons and wounded others, witnesses said.
“They stormed the community when most of the people were at their farms and markets, this is the first time they are succeeding in Ruwan Tofa. Many times they have wanted to invade but the people resist them. Unfortunately, they have succeeded this time,” a resident, Murtala Maiwada, told HumAngle on Sunday.
“They killed 26 people, 17 people just came into the hospital but one has died,” he said.
Another resident, Jamilu Ruwan Tufa, said, “they came om over 100 bikes, shooting sporadically; we tried to repel them but they were too many. So far we have counted 26 but we are still trying to access the forest.”
According to Murtala, the area is under the control of bandits.
“They stop people on the road and rob them and still come to the community and take us.
“My friend has his entire family with bandits for three months now. He has paid N1.5 million but they have not released them, three wives and children, they are still raising money” to get them freed.
“The government deployed a combined security team to Bindin yesterday (Saturday) but the community is far from this area,” he said.
Another resident who pleaded anonymity said, “there’s no area in the whole Northwest with vast forest and land like Dansadau.
“In Dansadau there are only two military vehicles, this is a community close to Kuyanbana Forest and the root of banditry. We have tens of bandit groups, even the vehicles are borrowed from police, the entire soldiers in Dansadau are not up to 20.
“This is an area President (Muhammadu) Buhari visited and deployed 600 soldiers in 2016.
A community leader said the people had requested for increased security and alerted the government three days earlier when the presence of the criminals was noticed but there was no response and the military personnel on the ground said there was no equipment for them to work.
However, the police said they deployed personnel immediately after the attack.
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