Benue State was thrown into fresh mourning on Tuesday as gunmen struck yet again, this time storming Afia community in Ukum Local Government Area, leaving 11 villagers dead and several others wounded in the early hours of the morning.
The blood of innocent farmers had barely dried from last week’s carnage — where over 50 people were massacred — when the latest wave of violence swept through the heart of Ukum.
The Ter Ukum, His Royal Highness Chief Iyorkyaa Kaave, speaking amid visible anguish during a security meeting in Makurdi, described the attack as a continuation of a “calculated onslaught” to displace indigenous communities.
“It began on Thursday in Logo, spread on Good Friday, and now Afia has been hit. The bodies keep turning up. Our people are missing. We’re not even done burying the last victims,” he said in a voice trembling with grief.
According to the monarch, the attackers descended on Afia at dawn, unleashing gunfire that tore through homes and families. By the time the chaos cleared, 11 villagers had been butchered, their blood soaking the soil they once tilled for food.
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“These are not the Fulani we knew in the past,” Chief Kaave said, recounting a more peaceful time. “What we see now are armed invaders, coming not with cattle, but with assault rifles — they kill our people in their sleep and settle in their homes.”
Kaave made a passionate plea to President Bola Tinubu, urging him to resist any temptation to negotiate with what he called “murderers with a mission.”
“We cannot share our land with death,” he declared. “These killers have a clear agenda — kill, displace, and occupy. And if the federal government fails to act now, we may not have a people left to protect.”
With yet another community grieving and the number of the dead still rising, the cries from Benue grow louder, echoing a painful question that remains unanswered: how many more must die before something is done?