At least 12 forest guards were killed when gunmen invaded a community in north-central Nigeria, local police reported on 29th Sept.
No group has claimed responsibility for the Sunday killings in Oke-Ode, a Kwara state community, police spokesman Adetoun Ejire-Adeyemi said in a statement.
The attacks are a routine occurrence in Nigeria’s north, where native herders and farmers regularly come into conflict over scarce access to land and water. The farmers blame the herders, who are largely of Fulani origin, for allowing their livestock to graze on their crops and destroying their harvests. The herders claim the lands are grazing paths, which were first legally supported in 1965, five years after Nigeria became independent.
The remains of the 12 guards were discovered by a group of police officials and members of the National Forest Security Service.
“The victims had multiple gunshot wounds,” Ejire-Adeyemi said, while four other survivors are receiving treatment at the hospital.
The governor of Kwara state, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, has urged the military to “rout the criminals behind attacks in parts of the state.”
He wrote in a statement: “I call on our courageous citizens to keep calm and resist the urge to turn on ourselves. I also applaud all the forest guards and the local hunters who, while losing five of their colleagues, equally repelled some of the attackers.”
In June, at least 150 individuals were murdered in one attack on a Nigerian community within the north-central state of Benue.
