How gunmen killed 1, kidnapped over 20 in Kaduna – Witness


Armed bandits suspected to be kidnappers numbering about 15 have kidnapped over 20 people and killed one person at Danbushiya Village of Millennium City, Chikun Local Government Area (LGA) of Kaduna state.
According to an eyewitness, who identified himself as Malam Danlami Isah, the gunmen stormed the area around 9:30pm last Sunday, posing as security agents in uniform and picked their victims on the road just before the bridge linking Danbushiya and Keke communities, in an operation that lasted over one hour.


According to Isah, who said he has been in the area for over eight years, “This is my shop, I sell traditional medicine here. I have been here for the past nine years, when this area was not even this developed, but I can tell you, I have never seen this type of evil before. I’m yet to recover from the trauma. 


“Because of these street lights, I sometimes close late from here. But that day, I closed after the 8:00pm prayer, I was in front of my house over there. All of a sudden, around 9:30pm, I saw people in military and police uniforms. They stayed just by that bridge, and started checking vehicles, motorcycles and even pedestrians.


“When they started, they allowed some people to pass and stopped others. I don’t know why they allowed some people to go and stopped others, but I later gathered that they pretended to be checking compliance with the use of facemask.
“But, I started suspecting that, they were fake security personnel when they started shouting at a motorist to come out of his car and lie down and they started stepping on him. At that point, they were stopping everyone that came to pass, they were no longer selecting, maybe they had realised that people had suspected that they were kidnappers.


“Then, they started marching people into that uncompleted building, while the rest of them waited on the road to pick more people, that was when they started shooting. At that point, I had to go into hiding. They were many, they were up to 15, with big guns in their hands like those of the police,” Malam Isah said.


He said security personnel did not come on time. “Even when the security people were coming, they were blaring sirens from afar. So, the bandits upon hearing the siren wrapped up their operation and left before security arrived.”
Malam Isah said, one of the captives escaped while they were marching them to the uncompleted building, but sadly, another man who attempted to do the same was shot to death on the spot.
Another resident of the area, who preferred anonymity said he escaped the incident because he stopped on the road to buy things for his children. 
“After buying things for my children at a store in town, someone called to inform me of what was going on in the community. 


“Then, I was coming on my bike with caution, when I reached the bridge (linking Millennium City to Kaduna City), I saw some police checkpoint but I moved on until I got to Danbushiya junction, then, I saw many people parked by the road side, then I joined them. We were there for more than 30 minutes before the road became clear.
“When I got to the scene, I saw many cars abandoned. I saw one of my friend’s cars too, so I thought he had been kidnapped too. Then, I called him, he picked the call and told me that he parked his car when he saw the checkpoint and decided to stop and check the progress of the work at a site he was supervising close to the scene. He was there until he started hearing gunshots, then he ran for his life, abandoning his car,” he said.
When the police was contacted to find out whether there has been any arrest in connection to the incident or if any of the victims has been released, Kaduna State Police Public Relations Officer, ASP Mohammed Jalige, promised to contact the Divisional Police Officer in charge of Millennium City and revert back but was yet to to so.

Millennium City, a fast developing suburb that lies less than 10 kilometers to Kaduna City, consists of several developing villages and over 13 different housing estates. 

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