In what the Police have described as indicating the success of its community policing model, terrorists invaded a village in Yobe State to warn them not to give information to the Police and other security agencies.
Residents of Mafa village in Tarmuwa Local Government Area of Yobe State were thrown into disarray after suspected terrorists invaded the village with rifles and Rocket-Propelled Grenade (RPG) razing over 50 motorcycles, shops and houses.
The police authorities in Yobe State are yet to ascertain the level of fatalities since the incident occurred at about 4 pm on Sunday.
There are also claims that an unspecified number of the residents were abducted during the incident.
As of press time, the Yobe Police Command said its operatives are assessing the situation to identify the level of casualties and the extent of damages to the residents’ properties while ensuring the averting of a recurrence.
Speaking to NewsNGR in an interview on Monday, the spokesperson of the Yobe Police Command, Dungus Abdulkarim revealed that the attackers had previously issued warnings to the villagers two weeks before the incident occurred.
He revealed, “Sometime last two weeks, some of the terrorists had surrounded a weekly market in Mafa that takes place every Friday to warn the people against giving the police and military intelligence or speaking about their activities, and this is a result of the effective community policing structure of the command.
“Even about that time, the vigilante in the community had arrested many members belonging to the armed men, and at the moment I am presuming that to be the reason for the mayhem in the community.
“However, we have begun an investigation, doing background work to identify the level of damages including the houses set ablaze and shops that were destroyed and looted.
“Some people were also shot dead but up to now, we do not have a decisive record of what truly happened and the level of damages.
“This is because, for an onslaught like this, you cannot just immediately state the actual number of casualties.
“There are probabilities of some to have been taken into captivity, and some killed in the forest, which these things (data) are likely to take you time to actualise.”
Abdulkarim further admitted the likelihood of a resurgence of terror activities in the region but noted that Yobe still enjoys relative peace across the state. He said the nature of the resurgence is basically civilian-targeted and rarely targeted at the military.
The recent incident comes on the heels of concurrent attacks in some of the soft target communities in the North East and North West regions of the country.
The SBM Intelligence noted that Nigeria’s security challenges have evolved into a complex and multifaceted crisis, manifesting in various forms nationwide.
“As the state’s influence wanes, armed groups and non-state actors have stepped in to fill the power vacuum, establishing control in different regions. As the military wound down its operations in the Northeast, both Boko Haram factions regained strength, increasing their mobility and reintroducing suicide bombings,” the SBM Intelligence said.