NIGERIA'S ongoing ethnic crisis involving violent clashes between nomadic Fulani herdsmen and local farming communities escalated significantly yesterday when cattle rearers attacked the Ukpabi Nimbo community in Enugu State killing about 48 people. Over recent months, the growing menace of Fulani herdsmen clashing with local communities over grazing rights has escalated frighteningly, often with bloody consequences. Yesterday's attack raised the heat a lot further as the violent clash in Uzo-Uwani Local Government Area of Enugu State also resulted in the destruction of property worth millions of naira.
Local sources put the casualty figure at 48 and about 60 persons reportedly sustained varying degrees of injuries while tens of residential buildings were burnt down. Eyewitnesses said the herdsmen in their numbers invaded the community in the early hours of yesterday with guns, bows and arrows, machetes and swords and ensured that any human being within sight was hacked.
But for the arrival of a combined team of police and military personnel led by the Enugu State Police Commissioner Nwodibo Ekechukwu, the situation would have been worse. No fewer than 30 corpses, most of which were recovered from farmlands, were said to have been deposited at the Bishop Shanahan Hospital, Nsukka, while intensive search for more bodies are ongoing in the area.
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A mortician at Bishop Shanahand Hospital, said: "Some 30 dead bodies were brought to the hospital this morning with 22 injured persons. I also learnt that some dead bodies and other injured persons were taken to other neighbouring hospitals for treatment.” Despite the presence of security operatives, most local villagers have already deserted the communities for fear of more attacks by the herdsmen who were said to have made the area an attack centre in recent times. However, Ebere Amaraizu, a spokesman for the Enugu State Police Command, said the total number of casualties could not be ascertained as of the time of filing this report. Mr Amaraizu added: “We moved in to ensure that the situation did not degenerate beyond control and right now everything is under control.
Read the pre-news about this attack: BREAKING NEWS: GUNMEN KILLED 48 IN ENUGU
The commissioner of police is there with other officers and men and the area is being secured but we can’t give the total number of casualties yet." Many members of the Ukpabi Nimbo community, who are mostly farmers, have their homes around their farmlands but the herdsmen did not spare their houses, as well as farms and crops as they were all destroyed. Sources in the community disclosed that the villagers had been resisting the use of their farmlands as grazing fields by the herdsmen, which led to the attack.
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Things degenerated further after some herdsmen who operate in Ukpani Nimbo and other communities in the Uzo-Uwani area claimed that their cows were missing and that some of their colleagues were killed in the area. Villagers alleged that most of the herdsmen that were involved in yesterday attack were imported from Nasarawa State by other Fulani herdsmen who were already operating in Enugu.
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