At least four people, including the driver, were killed when bandits attacked a Katsina State Transport Authority bus with license plate KT 14D-58 KT on Sunday morning.
The attack occurred around the villages of Mil Takwas and Farun Bala, about five kilometers from the Natsinta army barracks at around 11:34 a.m.
The bus was attacked on the Jibia-Katsina road leading to Maradi in the Republic of Niger.
PREMIUM TIMES reports that there are more than 18 security checkpoints on the 38-kilometre road from the capital city, Katsina, to Magama Cuttlefish.
Nasir Muhammad, whose wife was one of the passengers on the bus, told PREMIUM TIMES that the bus was one of four vehicles attacked.
“My wife called me around 11:47 am crying that they had been attacked. I was in Katsina while she came from Cuttlefish to meet me. She told me that her driver was already killed and that there were other vehicles in front that were attacked,” she said.
Jibia local government chairman Bashir Maitan confirmed the attack on journalists in Katsina on Sunday night, but argued that only one person was killed.
“Yes, there was an attack on motorists today. We were informed of the movement of some bandits in the morning and while I was mobilizing the guards and security agents, we heard that the bandits had launched an attack,” he said.
He said the bandits’ movement was traced from Gangara village to Kahel and connected to the main road.
“The bandits opened fire on the vehicle when it was obvious that the driver was trying to back up on seeing them,” he added.
“When I arrived at the Natsinta Barracks, they were soldiers who asked us not to continue because the bandits were attacking motorists, but I told them that my wife was in the attacked vehicle. I was one of the first to go there because even the president of the local government met me there,” she said.
He said that aside from the driver, two other people died while the fourth died in the Umaru Musa Yar’adu’a University Teaching Hospital (formerly Federal Medical Center).
“I took my wife to the hospital along with some people while the president and other government officials took the rest to the hospital. While living in the hospital with my wife at around 4pm one of the injured passengers died,” she said.
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Katsina State Transport Authority managing director Haruna Rugoji confirmed the attack to the Nigerian News Agency in Katsina.
Rugoji said the armed men collected the phones and other things belonging to some of the passengers and left the scene.
“The driver of the vehicle who told us what really happened said that none of the passengers were kidnapped by the bandits.
“Since then, we have not heard any report that one of the passengers in the vehicle is missing,”
The spokesman for the Police Command in Katsina state, Gambo Isa, has not commented on the attack. His phone number was not connected when PREMIUM TIMES contacted him #
Katsina, like several other northwestern states and a part of the central north, has been struggling with insecurity, especially cattle rustling, kidnapping for ransom and other forms of bandit activity for years.