By Amos Aar, in Makurdi
SUSPECTED herdsmen militia last Friday reportedly ambushed personnel of the Benue Agro-Rangers and Livestock Guard in Makurdi, the state capital.
The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Benue State Command, in a statement made available to National Record on Sunday morning signed by Civil Defence Public Relations Officer (CDPRO) Mr Ejelikwu Michael (DSC), said: “Today being 29th April, 2022, at about 13:30hrs, Agro-Rangers personnel who were providing security coverage to Livestock Guards who had arrested some cows violating the open grazing law were ambushed by suspected heavily armed herdsmen along “Iniongon” area, near Lower Basin farming site in Makurdi LGA, Benue State.
“Unfortunately, two casualties were recorded on the side of Agro-Rangers. One Livestock Guard personnel was also killed”.
According to the statement, “the Agro-Rangers personnel killed were: Alexander Odeh (Assistant Superintendent of Corps II), Ajoko Terwase (ASCII). Another Agro-Rangers personnel, Ortserga Terwase (CCA), was also shot on his lap and is receiving treatment in a hospital and he is stable”.
It adds that the Livestock Guard killed was Mr John Saaondo while the corpses of the casualties have been deposited at the Benue State University Teaching Hospital mortuary.
A dependable source from Iniongon area of the ambush, in a telephone call with our correspondent, also confirmed that, “the Agro-Rangers and Livestock Guards were on their usual surveillance and they went to Lower Benue where Fulani herdsmen have been grazing their cows on people’s vegetable farms seriously these days. So, they were there on a mission to confiscate the cows if found but they didn’t see cows and started returning back.
“While they were on their way to Lower Benue, somebody, suspected to be a soldier phoned Fulani herdsmen militia who were in Wadata Market here [Makurdi] not the ones in the bush because they used a speed boat and passed my house here.
“They stopped at a place where people mould burnt bricks near Lower Benue and laid ambush inside the burnt bricks because bullets don’t penetrate those bricks. Then they opened fire on the personnel and if the agro rangers were not trained, the herdsmen would have killed them all. I stood in my compound and was listening to the loud gunshots; it was terribly loud as if people were fighting a war.
“Two personnel were killed, two missing up till today while one person sustained gunshot injury on his lap. It’s like the Fulani herdsmen kidnapped the two missing personnel because they are yet to be found
“We are suspecting that the herdsmen militia have camped in Wadata Market, Makurdi because they came out from there,” the source reasoned.
