Pioneer ruler of Dnata chiefdom located in Tafa Town along the Abuja-Kaduna highway, Chief Bitrus James, has lamented that bandits have sacked territorial communities under his rulership.
James disclosed this during an interview with Daily Trust as he cried out that the activities of bandits have restrained his subjects from farming.
The monarch’s community was carved out of Kagarko by the immediate past Kaduna State governor, Malam Nasir el-Rufai, in 2022.
He mentioned six communities – Gadunda, Kwakulu, Jida, Isa, Kuyeri and Mpape that are currently sacked by bandits.
The chief said bandits ravaged Gadunda on December 2, 2023 and ordered villagers to leave and only to return if they paid N10 million.
He added that some herders close to the hamlet who had initially ignored the order had to flee the community when the bandits started slaughtering their chickens and other animals for consumption.
The assailants also forced the wives of the villagers to cook food for them, after raping them.
Aside from Gadunda, the other five communities experienced the same criminal activities perpetrated by the bandits as about 300 to 500 kidnappers were running various camps in the areas.
He said from December 24 till date, bandits had carried out several operations, moving from one community to another and abducting their victims at will.
“They first went to Gami village and abducted some residents, then Tafa-Pai, Tafa-Gari, as well as Pariga, where they killed three people and abducted 10 others,” James said.
“They also killed three people in Mpape, a village under Kagarko Local Government Area, not that of the FCT.”
He said N10 million ransom was paid in the case of one of the villages named Parigy, only for the kidnappers to kill one of the victims and placed another N10 million demand as a new condition to release the remaining 10 victims.
He said that in the case of Mpape, the ransom was paid but the bandits still demanded six special motorcycles, each costing N1.5 million.
He said the latest incident took place in Jidna in the early hours of Friday, where seven residents were kidnapped.
The monarch said the bandits seemed to operate in synergy with their counterparts around forests in the FCT, Niger, Kaduna and Nasarawa states, swapping their victims in different directions to make them feel that they had been taken away to far destinations.
“We need a similar synergy among our neighbouring states to achieve a desired goal. I have earmarked 100 hectares of land within my domain and urged the Chief of Defence Staff to use it for military barracks,” he stated.
“This is a very strategic location next to Abuja. We hope that our governor, Senator Uba Sani, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the Chief of Defence Staff would come together to achieve this.
“My people don’t know any profession apart from farming, yet their means of livelihood is being threatened by these bandits who demand up to N10 million from a farmer who has never seen such amount of money in his lifetime. For the sake of our proximity to Abuja, this issue shouldn’t be taken lightly.”
