Gunmen have killed a local security volunteer and at least ten members of his family in Nigeria’s northwestern Zamfara State, set their home ablaze, and abducted 13 other people, police have said.
The attackers raided Gidan Taba village in Maradun district over the weekend, targeting the volunteer after he repeatedly helped security forces repel armed groups from the community, Zamfara police spokesperson Yazid Abubakar said on Monday.
“They considered him an obstacle to their activities,” Abubakar said. Security forces have since been deployed to the area and are working to secure the release of the 13 abductees, he added.
Local reports initially put the death toll at 12 members of the same family, including women and children. A resident told Nigerian newspaper PUNCH that the victims had taken refuge in a room to avoid abduction before the attackers set it on fire.
Maradun council chairman Sanusi Ahmad Dosara also said in a Facebook post on Sunday that 12 people were killed in the “horrific” Gidan Taba attack. He said he had attended the funeral of the victims. In a separate post the on Monday, Dosara said he met the commander of the Nigerian Army’s 1 Brigade in Zamfara over worsening attacks that he said were causing loss of life and property in Maradun, and called for stronger military action to restore security.
Days earlier, the Nigerian Police Force said armed bandits ambushed officers traveling to Zamfara for election duty, killing five and wounding two others. Seven officers were rescued, while the attackers made off with five service rifles. Police said joint forces were still searching for the gunmen and the stolen weapons.
Zamfara has been at the center of a long-running security crisis in northwest Nigeria, where armed groups locally known as bandits raid villages, abduct residents for ransom, steal livestock, and attack major roads. In January 2024, the state government launched a Community Protection Guard to support police and military operations against the violence.
In July, at least 24 farmers were killed in attacks on communities in Talata Mafara, while more than 150 people, mostly women and children, were reported abducted from villages in Bukkuyum in April. In June, police said gunmen seized seven students from off-campus accommodation in Kaura Namoda.
The latest attack comes amid a wider security crisis across Africa’s most populous nation, including a jihadist insurgency in the northeast that began in 2009 with Boko Haram and later Islamic State West Africa Province. Nigeria’s military said last week that 588 operations in September and October killed 435 terrorists and bandits, led to 809 arrests, and rescued 717 kidnapped victims.