Military Kill Five Youths Allegedly Mistaken For Kidnappers In Taraba
BY AMEH IDUJAGI, JALINGO – Five Youths from Basa village in Ardo-Kola Local Government Area of Taraba State were on Thursday night sent to the great beyond by soldiers who shot and killed allegedly mistaken for kidnappers.
The not too lucky youths, it was gathered were returning from a wedding ceremony which took place in Garin-Baka late on Thursday night when some soldiers, who laid ambush for kidnappers in the area opened fire on them thereby killing five instantly.
One of the lucky youths, who narrowly escaped the bullets from the military guns, Isah Umar, said they were returning from a wedding ceremony of one of their friends in Garin-Baka on motorcycles going back to Basa, their village when they ran into a group of soldiers.
Umar, a student of the Taraba State University, said that on sighting the convoy of their motorcycles, the soldiers opened fire on them.
He said he narrowly escaped into the bush but his friend Habu Yerima, who conveyed him on his motorcycle was not lucky as he was killed by the bullet.
It was gathered that the incident was a mistaken identify but the parents of the victims are insisting that the military personnel intentionally murdered their children.
Two of the victims were identified as students of the Taraba State University and the Taraba State College of Agriculture all based in Jalingo.
Relations of the victims who besieged the mortuary of Federal Medical Centre, Jalingo told our correspondent that their children were innocent and not criminals but were deliberately murdered in cold blood by the military.
Bello Aliyu Jen, who lost two of his children in the incident, insisted that the soldiers deliberately killed his children, whose names he gave as Abdulkadir Bello and Tukur Bello.
According to Aliyu; “I received an information that the victims explained to the soldiers that they were returning from a Wedding ceremony at Garin Baka but the soldiers ignored them and opened fire at close range killing five of the boys instantly”.
He called for an investigation into the murder, saying; “We need justice, the army must be accountable for the murder of our innocent children”.
The five victims whose corpses were deposited by the soldiers at mortuary of the Federal Medical Centre, Jalingo, include Abdulkadir Bello, Tukur Bello, Philip Yakubu, Habu Yarima and Ya’u Misa.
Efforts to reach the police public relations officer of the Taraba State Police command, ASP David Misal for the confirmation of the incident did not yield any result as he did not respond to several calls put across to his phone by our correspondent.
