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- By: Bomba Dauda
The President of Southern kaduna People’s Union, SOKAPU, Hon. Jonathan Asake, led some members of his Central Executive Committee (CEC) to Rimau town, Kallah ward, in Kajuru LGA of kaduna state.
In a press statement made available to Gurara Accord by SOKAPU, it stated that, At the public primary school in Rimau, we saw hundreds of IDPs there. The deeply traumatised villagers told us very heart wrenching stories.
According to the villagers, Fulani residents of these communities became hosts to strange Fulani who rode in on score of motorbikes on the 18th May. Despite assurances by the local Fulani to their long time Adara hosts, that the unfreindly looking guest meant no harm to them it turned to be a ruse.
When one helicopter hovered over the villages at very low altitude, they recalled how the sighting of such helicopters meant death, as told by their kinsmen from other parts who had suffered killings in 2019.
Some of the villagers started moving out their children, wives and the old.
Then in the evening of 19th May, 2020, all hell broke loose. From village to village the Fulani started shooting, burning homes, churches, foodstuffs and killings.
The invaders also looted valuables and rustled livestock.
Between the 19th to the 21st of May 2020, despite desperate SOS calls to relevant authorities for assistance, not a single police, military personnel, SSS, Civil Defence or any government official came.
As at yesterday, the villagers said those who braved it to return to their villagers to find situation of things, said there were at least 30 decomposing corpses strewn about the villages. The Fulani invaders are still patrolling these villages as at yesterday.
They said that more might have died either of gunshots wounds, or from fatal injuries from matchete cuts. As at yesterday 30th May, 2020, there were not less than 60 villagers that had been missing since 19hth May, 2020 when the onslaught started.
We were given some of the names of the dead and missing ones.
There are currently 5 IDP centres in that axes, with the biggest being in Kallah town. So far, not less that 50,000 Adara natives have been displaced in Kajuru LGA since last year.
In all their narrations yesterday, two things stood out: the invaders came from a neighboring Fulani settlement that locals call “Tampol” which is Laduga grazing reserves.
Next is the name of one Fulani ardo, who the natives gave his name as ardo Makawo of Libere communty. He is to said to have networked the invasions with the attackers. He is working a free man today.
Thought we took limited foodstuffs and clothes to them, it is too insufficient we feed the teeming hordes of starving women and children we saw and spoke to.
And of all the destruction that has been visited on the Adara nation since last year, Kaduna State governor, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai has not condemned the carnage nor assisted the displaced natives with any palliatives.
It is therefore not strange that the Kaduna State Police command is standing firm to deny these atrocities. If this is not a cover up, what is it?
These are some of the reasons that SOKAPU is insisting that the unrelenting violence visited on the Adara nation in Kajuru LGA, and other affected Southern Kaduna communities have all the elements of ethnic cleansings.
All that these innocent, harmless law abiding Adara natives want is for them to be allowed to bury their dead with dignity. It is inhumanity of the worst form to desecrate the dead in this manner.
They want the invaders chased out so that they can return to their homes and start life from the scratch.
In conclusion we are calling on the Federal government to also deploy the same military might it is weilding in Sokoto and Katsina state in fighting bandits to do same for Southern Kaduna.
We are also calling on the United Nations, Amnesty International, the International Criminal Court, European Union Commission and all international and national bodies that matter to come to our aid.
