Armed men suspected to be marauding herdsmen, ambushed and killed two farmers returning from Jato Aka Market at Nzaav, Yaav Council Ward in Turan community, Kwande local government area of Benue State yesterday evening.
A community leader, Lawrence Akerigba, told our correspondent that the herders first invaded farmlands and started shooting sporadically at farmers who were harvesting their crops.
Most of the farmers on hearing the gunshots fled into the bush but the herders got some of them who went to the Jato Aka Market, killing two on the spot while those who fled into bush are yet to return.
“As I speak to you we have already recovered the corpses of two farmers who were returning from Jato- Aka market, however we are yet to know the fate of those who were attacked on their farms because it is already night, we will comb the bushes tomorrow morning in search of those missing.
“We want to call on the international community and the Nigerian authorities to swiftly come to our aid to end this ethnic cleansing of our people, we are helpless and defensless” Akerigba added. Efforts to get the police spokesperson Udeme Edet failed as she neither picked calls or messages nor returned them.
