10 Choir Girls, 6 Others Abducted As Gunmen Storm Church In Kaduna
The Oasis Reporters
May 20, 2019
The notoriety of Northern Nigeria’s insecurity rears itself once more as
unknown gunmen have attacked a Church belonging to the Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA) in Birnin Gwari local government area of Kaduna State and abducted about 10 girls and seven other persons.
It was unclear whether the pastor of the church, Rev. Zachariya Ido, in Dankade Village in the troubled Birnin Gwari local government area was among the kidnapped victims.
Another gang of gunmen have also killed one Obadiah Samson and kidnapped two members of Nasara Baptist church Guguwa village, near Rigasa in Igabi local government area of Kaduna State.
Confirming the kidnapping of the 10 Girls and five others In Birnin Gwari, the Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) of the local government, Pastor Emmanuel Ibrahim, said the gunmen stormed the Church on Saturday evening when the girls and other men were having a fellowship of choristers.
He said: “the gunmen stormed the church when the they were holding a combined Choir Fellowship, they asked everyone in the church to surrender his or her phones and demanded for the whereabouts of the pastor.”
“After threatening the choristers on the whereabouts of the Church Pastor, the choristers then became afraid and showed them the pastor’s home. They went and took him away, his daughter with 15 others amongst which there is the son of the pastor of Assemblies of God Church,” he said.
Rev. Nath Waziri, Secretary of Zaria District Church Council (DCC) Of the ECWA, in a text message also confirmed the abduction of his members.
“Sad to inform you that one of our pastors, his daughter and other members of the ECWA Church, Dankade were kidnapped early hours of Saturday night. Let’s pray for God’s intervention and deliverance,” the text from Reverend Nath Waziri read.
Kidnapping of Christian schoolgirls and attacks on churches was made a prominent strategy of the Boko Haram Islamist insurgency in the northeast but has now wakened up such passion in the so called Fulani herdsmen terrorism in the largely North West region of Nigeria, where fellow Muslim Hausa communities have equally suffered massacres and kidnappings in the hands of the notorious herdsmen bandits.
As many more people are kidnapped in the entire north creating a huge inflow in millions of naira to the bandits in ransom payments, a determined strategy of the Nigerian military is being eagerly awaited to counter the strategy, but currently people remain at the mercy of the bandits, making life brutish and sad, in what is seen as desperate times in the north where illiteracy is rife and religious fundamentalism has grown out of proportion.
Additional reporting : Kakaaki news