No fewer than 7 persons were in the early hours of Tuesday reportedly killed and many missing when suspected herdsmen attacked Uchen, a community in Gwer West local government area of Benue state.
Uchen is located 18 kilometers on the Makurdi – Naka road. The attack reportedly took place between 2am and 3 am.
A resident of the area and member of the Community Peace Observers (CPOs) in Makurdi, who simply gave her name as Patience, said four members of Aernyi Igba family
were wiped out by the attackers, while three others who were trying to escape the attack were ambushed by the assailants and killed.
She said: “We heard gunshots through the night till about 3am this morning. I’ve been on the phone throughout with some of the CPOs there and it has been bloody.
“So far, 7 bodies have been recovered this morning and others are missing. It is too early to ascertain the number of the dead and the displaced.”
Another resident, Tyohange Solomon, also a member of CPOs said, “Although there is an army base in the community, the soldiers didn’t show up when the attack was going on. They came this morning.”
He said their complaint when the attack was going on was that, “if they showed up that night, there will be no way for them to differentiate between Fulani and Tiv people resident in the community.”
Meanwhile, protest had broken out in the morning by the community members over the incessant Fulani attacks in the area.
It was gathered that the protesters, who were visibly angry, barricaded the road with corpses and rendered commuters plying the road stranded for several hours.