Plateau State is on the boil again. No fewer than seven lives have been lost and many others injured in fresh violence. Security has been tightened.

Six people believed to be members of the same family were killed in a pre-dawn attack yesterday in Rawhinku, a remote village in Bassa local government area. The attacks according to sources, was carried out by unknown gunmen suspected by the villagers to be Fulani herdsmen.

On Sunday night, two young men were injured after being attacked while a clash between Berom farmers and Fulani headsmen last week in Jos South resulted in one death and injuries to two women.

The two victims of the Sunday night attacks are in critical condition at the intensive care unit of the Bingham University Teaching Hospital (BUTH), Jos.

Spokesman of the Military Special Joint Task Force (JTF) on Jos crises Lt. Col. Kingsley Umoh confirmed the kilings in Rawhinku. He said: “Six people were killed in similar murders in Mazah and Dogo Nahawa”.

According to Umoh, “three others sustained injuries”. He said the “three who have been receiving treatment in a local clinic in Bassa, have been transferred to a “bigger hospital in Jos “.

Col. Umoh said the JTF “received a distressed call one hour after the Rawhinku attack.”

He regretted that it took one hour for his men to access the village because of the poor state of the road, adding that by the time they got there it was no longer possible to do anything about the killings other than to put in measures to prevent a recurrence.

Plateau State Police Command spokesman ASP Muhammed Lerama said: “Two young men, Nuhu Magaji and Tochukwu Iwebuke, both residents of Angwa Soya, Jos North Local Government Area, were allegedly attacked while returning to their homes after attending a concert at the Jos trade fair by yet to be identified men”

One of the victims Iwebuke said: “I went to the Trade Fair and as I was coming back around 9 to 10pm, a group of Hausa boys came to me, they did not talk to me. All of a sudden, they started stabbing me with knife, one of them stabbed me in the back, another one stabbed me on my face.

“When I realised that they will kill me if I wait, I started running towards the nearest location where the military Task Force is stationed. They pursued me but left when they noticed I was running towards the JTF.”

Magaji, who was stabbed in the head, was rushed to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the Bingham University Teaching Hospital (BUTH), Jos due to severe head injuries and was promptly operated.

Mrs. Hila Samuel, the Chief Nursing Officer of the BUTH told The Nation that “the victims are responding to treatment”

The police denied that the attacks were as a result of poor security situation at the Trade Fair. “These attacks were not carried out at the venue of the trade fair, they happened when the victims had left the premises of the Trade Fair.

“However, we will not leave any stone unturned in arresting the perpetrators and prevent such attacks by deploying more security agents to patrol the areas.”

Although the JTF could not confirm if some houses were torched, a victim, Yero Abari, said two houses were burnt, one being his family house. He said two members of his family were killed. Those killed, he said, were women and children who were hacked to death by unknown persons.

The latest attacks are coming after several secret murders that have allegedly been going on in the state in the last two weeks. Though no arrest has been made by the JTF, our reporter gathered that members of the Rinwanku community since the dawn attack have launched a manhunt for the attackers.

The manhunt by members of the community was said to have resulted in the community arresting one of the attackers who was said to have missed his way. The suspect, after interrogation, was said to have confessed that he knew where the other attackers were hiding.

The suspect was taken to the Rukuba road police outpost. President of the Irigwe Development Association, Hon. Philip Alli, said the pre-dawn attack on his people was “premeditated since the killers knew that the area was just one kilometre from Rukuba barracks.”

Senator Gyang Dantong representing Plateau North Senatorial district condemned the killings and the damage to farms.

He urged the security operatives to intensify efforts in tracking down perpetrators of this heinous crime.

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To me as a plateau man,i think the fulani and the hausa muslims are not longer welcome to plateau state.

the government should stop the people from carring daggers and knives,and this is very common with people from the north who are aleays carrying daggers under their waist.the problem now facing nigeria is that nigerians are enermy to nigerians.before it use to be the igbo man but now the reverse.