Gun battle between vigilante members and bandits have left at least eight people dead following an attempt by bandits to invade Gangara village of Tsafe local government area in Zamfara state Friday morning.
Reports revealed that the fight occured when the bandits mobilized to revenge Killing of their colleague.
A resident of Tsafe, Abubakar Bala, said that the fight started when some people of Fegin Baza village went to attend a wedding ceremony in Gangara on Thursday but one of them was killed by bandits in their way back.
“The bandits, when they sighted the three people coming back from Gangara, they just opened fire on them and killed one person. They (people of Fegin Baza) however mobilized and killed one of the bandits who didn’t have a gun. The other bandits, ran for their lives because they were only two but also mobilized their people to storm Gangara, thinking that those who killed their brother were from Gangara.
“But the vigilante members were earlier informed of the impending attack by the bandits so they prepared and waited for the bandits. The fight between the two groups went on for four hours before security agents went in to help the vigilante members,” he said.
On the number of those killed, he said he has seen two corpses of the vigilante members brought to Tsafe by the Special Force Squad but locals said the number of vigilante members killed were eight.
Mustapha (second name deliberately withheld), a native of Gangara working with School of Health Technology in Tsafe said he knew eight of those killed.
“Six vigilante members and two other residents of our town were killed yesterday by the bandits while several others seriously got wounded. As I speak to you, there is no one in the community because they know that the security agents can’t protect them. They have all fled to Tsafe and other neighboring communities,” he said.
