In the last five to ten years, many communities in the mostly agrarian Chikun, Igabi, Kajuru and Birnin-Gwari local government areas of Kaduna State have come under series of attacks from bandits. Many have been killed, maimed or kidnapped while thousands of people were displaced after their communities were sacked.

The most worrisome are the Birnin-Gwari villages where bandits are firmly in charge. They take taxes to allow villagers access to their farms, recruit youths into terrorism, forcibly marry villagers’ daughters and turn the farmers into slaves.

The dark days however appear to be fading out as the communities, especially those in the suburbs of the state capital, now sleep with their two eyes closed, thanks to the military and police troops making great exploit against the dreaded gunmen.

Some the survivors of who spoke with The Nation however called for sustenance of the military operations against the bandits, saying that those who impoverished them and made them suffer, deserve no mercy.

We paid to bandits taxes we never paid to government – Farmer

A farmer in Birnin Gwari Local Government Area, Malam Musa Lawal, said himself and other farmers in Kungi village have paid to bandits sums of money they had never paid to the government since they were born.

He said: “These people took over our community and started telling us what to and what not to do. They started by kidnapping us, then we paid ransom and got released.

“Virtually every family in my village has had one or two people kidnapped and ransom paid. It got to a point that nobody could go to the farm again because they feared that they would be kidnapped. So, practically, we could not farm again.

“When the bandits now realised that we had nothing left to sell and pay them ransom, they allowed us to start going to the farm on condition that we would be paying them taxes from the profit we made from our farm produce.

“We agreed to that because help was not coming from the government. It is either you pay them money or they collect certain percent of your harvest.

“For example, if you harvest 10 bags of produce, they will collect two bags or even three bags. It is an outrageous form of tax that even government has never taken from us.

“In fact, I have never paid any direct tax to the government except you go to the market and they collect small money at the gate before you bring in your produce.

“In fact, the bandits are not even satisfied with what they are getting from us. They too are now farming because they feel we are getting more of the produce than them.

“We would not have had any problem with them using our land to also farm, but the problem is that they are too lazy to cultivate their own farm, so they force us to go and work on their farm without being paid.

“They have exploited us and now want to turn us into slaves on our ancestral land.

“So, we welcome this military operation, and we want it extended to the entire western part of Birnin-Gwari so that we can live a peaceful life once again.”

I’ll rather die than get kidnapped again -Septuagenarian

One of the survivors of the several kidnap attacks in Chikun Local Government Area, Alhaji Abdul Shafiu, a septuagenarian who was kidnapped in his home in August 2021 alongside his two daughters, told The Nation that he would rather be killed than get kidnapped again.

Shafiu said: “My kidnap experience was not just traumatic, it was deadly. So I will even prefer death to a repeat of that horrific experience.

“I am telling you, if kidnappers come for me again, God forbid, I will tell them I am not going with them.

“I know the worst they will do is to kill me, but I prefer death to that experience.”

He added: “On that fateful day, I went to the hospital for a check-up as I was just recovering from cold. I am asthmatic, so I don’t joke with my health.

“I was given medicines at the hospital and I was just in the sitting room waiting to have my dinner and take my medication before going to bed. It was just around 7 pm.

“Then my daughter came back from work, and as she was just driving into the compound, her sister went to open the door for her and these criminals jumped the fence into my compound and followed my daughters into the house.

“I wanted to move and one of them holding a machete threatened to cut me into pieces if moved. I would have dared him, but I just looked back and saw the other ones with guns, like brand new rifles, and I mellowed down.

“So, my two daughters and I were marched out of the house into the bush.

“I saw hell at the hands of those criminals. First, they subjected us to trekking kilometres in the bush barefoot. Luckily, my daughters had their own shoes on.

“Along the line, one of my daughters fell down and they couldn’t wait to pick her because they suspected that they were being chased by vigilante men. That was how she escaped.

“But for me and her sister, we spent three weeks in the bandits’ den. They moved us from one camp to another inside the forest.

“Eventually, my family sold our hard-earned property to pay ransom, both in cash and materials. They collected money in millions and two motorcycles before we were released.

“The most traumatic moment for me there was when the bandits were negotiating with my family members for ransom.

“The bandits, small boys, none of them by my estimation was up to 30 years of age, but they would put a gun on my shoulder while making phone call to my family and fire the gun. The sound at that close range would make me go deaf for close to one hour or even more.

“In fact, there was a day the gang leader, they called him Boka, asked me to put my leg on a log of wood, that since my family refused to cooperate, he would break my leg with bullet. I put my leg because I could not have objected, then he fired the shot.

“Then, I gradually turned my head, because I didn’t feel any pain. Then I discovered that the bullet didn’t hit me. I was terrified, but we made out alive.

“Now, I am happy because the security operatives have been arresting the bandits responsible for that operation, one after the other. Recently, I heard that, the gang leader, Boka himself has been arrested.

“Maybe now I can be thinking of going back to my house, because I have abandoned the house I built with my hard-earned gratuity for more than a year now. I will consider going back to my house because I know it is that Boka that is responsible for most attacks in the part of Chikun Local Government where I live.

“In fact, while I was in his captivity, he told me of the several attacks that I am also aware of, that he led operations.”

Bandits killed my security guard right in my front, but I escaped narrowly -Displaced landlord

A senior banker and landlord in New Millennium City, Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna State, said he saw death face to face, but he escaped miraculously as bandits shot his security guard right in his presence.

According to the banker, he went out with his security man popularly called Mai Guard that evening to assist a neighbour who had put a distress call to him, but the bandits, who had laid an ambush on the way, shot his guard in the head at close range.

He said: “Before that night in June 2020, we had never experienced bandits attack in our community. All we knew were petty thieves who came in the afternoon when everyone must have gone to work, to steal valuable items.

“So, that night, a neighbour who had told me on two occasions that some people usually came to knock on his window around 10 pm, put a call across to me that he just received a call from another neighbour of ours that some people were trying to break into his house.

“I quickly told my Mai Guard who had a local gun about the development and we moved. We first went to the house of the neighbour that called me and we all moved to house being attacked together.

“On our way, the Mai Guard, who was also holding a torch, was just flashing it round, then he beamed the light on one of the bandits who had laid ambush. Immediately, the bandits fired him in the head while the remaining two of us scampered to safety.

“We didn’t realise the enormity of the problem on our hands until my Mai Guard was shot. Then, the person who called me immediately called the soldiers of the task force in our area. Luckily for us, the soldiers came in less than 10 minutes.

“But before they came, the bandits had succeeded in breaking into the first house and taken one of our neighbours and his 12-year-old daughter. But they didn’t retreat immediately, because they obviously came with plan to break into houses and kidnap many people.

“So they were busy breaking the wall of another house when the soldiers arrived, but that didn’t deter them. They continued while a part of the group engaged the soldiers in a shootout. Eventually, they had to run away due to the superior fire power of the soldiers.

“Since then, it has been over two years now but I cannot go back to my house. I am now back to paying rent again. I know the situation is now calm, but it has not been easy for me, because it was like I saw the death that killed my Mai Guard but I just escaped by miracle.

“We are happy that the security agencies are now giving the bandits bleeding nose and we pray that the criminals are completely wiped out very soon.”

The military have in the past few weeks taken the battle to the doorstep of the bandits in their forest hideouts, neutralising the marauders, destroying their camps and rescuing hostages.