20 Villagers killed by Bokoharam For Failing To Provide N250,000

Gunmen suspected to be Boko Haram members have killed about 20 residents of  Kamuya village in Biu local government area of Borno State for allegedly failing to provide N250,000 to support their ‘crusade’, eyewitnesses have said.

The sect members were said to have asked the villagers about two months ago to raise the said N250,000 in support of what they called  “the work of God’ or risk being attacked.

LEADERSHIP gathered from impeccable sources that the gunmen,  who approached the village head and directed  him to  begin  the collection of the illegal tax from his subjects, later became angry when they found out that the poor villagers were able to gather only N70,000.

To execute their earlier their threat, the gunmen  yesterday  staged a deadly raid on the villagers by attacking the villagers while observing their weekly market in Kamuyya village and reportedly  shooting dead 20 persons and injuring several others.

A resident of Kamuyya, Abubakar Umar, who spoke to journalists on phone,  said: “When they issued such threat, we all took it lightly; everyone was relaxed and nobody bothered to make any extra effort to ensure that we raised the amount beyond what we could raise, which is about N70, 000. Maybe that was what ignited this bloody attack because we were unable to meet their demand”.

The villagers said the gunmen  who attacked to them came in the day time and began to shoot at the traders in the market for nearly five hours.

Umar further said, “They continued to shoot their guns for over a period and throughout that period which was over five hours and  there was no single security personnel to confront the invaders. They snatched several vehicles and loaded them with  bags of assorted foodstuffs , before leaving the town in the evening. They destroyed everything we had, they carted away our foodstuffs and burnt down the remaining ones.”

Source: Leadership