Boko Haram Kills Six Civilian JTF Members In Borno

Suspected members of Islamist sect Boko
Haram on Tuesday shot dead six members
of the youth vigilante group, popularly
called Civilian JTF in Borno State, in the
border town of Damasak, Mobar Local
Government Area of the state. Damasak is about 187 kilometres away
from Maiduguri, the state capital, and share
border with Niger Republic. The area is
believed to be the safe haven of the
insurgents after they were dislodged from
their bush camps and Maiduguri by the special forces. The youths who are mostly traders and
residents of Maiduguri, but volunteered to
help the Joint Task Force, JTF, in fighting
terrorism in the region, met their untimely
death when they were shot dead by four
gunmen in a house where they had gone to pass the night around 1 a.m. by four
gunmen. The names of the killed youths were given
as Ismail Alhaji Bunu, 36, Malam Goni, 27,
Buzu Bukar, 27, Mohammed Modu, 20, Aliyu
Jibrin, 30 and Bukar Bako, 20. It was learnt that five of the victims were
traders of necklaces while one of them was
a driver, who usually conveyed them to the
town’s market every Monday. A member of the vigilante group, Kariyama
Mohammed, who also went to Damasak, but
did not pass the night in the same house
with the victims, said: “We were travelling
together to Damasak to sell necklaces, but I
did not sleep in the same house with them. It was in the morning that I learnt of their
death.” Another resident of the town, who spoke to
journalists, said the assailants, who were
four in number, shot their victims dead
when they were fast asleep, before they
fled into the bush. The bodies of the victims were later seen at
the sector 1 headquarters of the Joint Task
Force (JTF) in Baga road, from where they
were conveyed to Maiduguri by policemen
from Damasak and later taken to their
family houses for burial. Expressing regrets over the death of the
youths, Chairman of the vigilante group in
Baga road, Alhaji A.D. Bakura said, the
deceased were members of the group who
worked tirelessly to defend the state from
the insurgents.