At least seven people have been killed in a fresh attack on Agbo Vengav Udam community in Gwer West Local Government Area of Benue State by suspected armed herders.
Residents told PUNCH Online that the assailants stormed the village around 7 pm on Thursday and opened fire indiscriminately, killing seven on the spot and abducting three others.
A local source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the attackers entered the community through a border village in Otukpo LGA.
‘They passed through the border village of Otukpo and, entering into Agbo, they shot their guns sporadically, killing the seven people on the spot. They took away three people with them,’ a resident of the affected community who did not want to state his name said.
It was gathered that an infant was among those killed and that the mother was abducted by the assailants.
The witness added that five of the bodies have been deposited in a morgue in Naka, while the families of the remaining two deceased opted to bury their dead without delay.
The incident, according to residents, has caused them to desert their homes for fear of further attacks.
Chairman of Gwer West LGA, Victor Ormin, confirmed the incident to our correspondent on the phone on Friday.
Omin, who lamented that the killing was coming after commercial vehicles were hijacked and passengers taken away, decried the activities of suspected armed herders in the local government.
The council boss said, ‘It’s true that scores of people were killed at Vengav Udam village within the local government Thursday night.
‘Two people who are critically injured during the attack are receiving treatment in Naka hospital, and the situation is becoming unbearable, the way these armed herders are wreaking havoc in the local government and the state as a whole’.
Calls and messages put through to the Police Public Relations Officer for Benue command, Catherine Anene, were not answered.
Some gunmen intercepted two commercial vehicles about three kilometres from Naka, headquarters of Gwer West LGA, on Thursday and abducted 14 passengers.
