…Orders re-opening of mosques, weekly markets
Sokoto bandits have started appointing and posting their members to head some villeges in Sabon-Birni local government area of Sokoto State.
Investigations revealed that the bandits, suspected to belong to the camp of Turji, have posted a village leader for Gangara village, who was sent away after the insurgents invited the villagers to a meeting in Saturu village on Thursday, October 4.
In attendance at the meeting were 5 Turji’s commanders, namely: ?an Ba??walo, Boka Tamis?e, Hassan ?an-?waro, Dogo as well as Jammu Ba?i.
The Gangara villagers were asked to select one from the five bandit commanders to serve as their village head, and they allegedly selected ?an Ba??walo, after which they were given some conditions by their ‘new District Head’.
The conditions are: there should not be a single Police officer in the village; there should be no military or Vigilante Group members seen in the village and that all disputes must be brought to the ‘head’.
The final condition was that the villagers must contribute the sum of N1.5 million and hand it to the new head in three weeks.
Recall that on Friday, October 5th, ?an Ba??walo ordered the immediate re-opening of three Juma’at mosques and the resumption of weekly (Tuesday) market activities in Gangara village, against the order of Sokoto State government of closure of all weekly markets.
At Ma?waruwa village, bandit commander Boka Tamis?e declared himself the new district head and summoned a meeting, where he directed the ‘ousted’ district head, one ?an Sani, to tell the villagers, by himself, who was now in charge. ?an Sani thereafter told the people there that Boka was now the new head of the village. The villagers have no option but to obey these bandits”, one of the villagers told newsmen.
All efforts to speak to Sokoto State Police Public Relations Officer, Abubakar Sani, proved abortive, as he did not respond to a text message sent to him as of the time of filing this report.
Hundreds of villages in Sabon-Birni LGA have fled due to the activities of bandits.
