At least 30 villagers were killed and several others abducted after gunmen raided a village in Nigeria’s northern Niger state, police said, in another deadly attack on a community with limited security protection.
The supplied AP evidence says the attackers stormed Kasuwan-Daji village in Borgu local government area on Saturday evening and opened fire on residents. Police spokesman Wasiu Abiodun said the gunmen also razed the local market and several houses. Residents gave higher death tolls, saying at least 37 people were killed and that the number could still rise because some people remained missing.
The report shows the gap that often appears in attacks of this kind: official numbers, local accounts and survivor estimates do not yet fully match. A Catholic Church spokesman in the area said more than 40 people were killed and several others, including children, were abducted. The police say they have deployed officers to search for those kidnapped, although local residents told reporters that security forces had not yet arrived.
The AP evidence says the attackers had been lurking around nearby communities for about a week before the raid. A resident quoted in the report said survivors were too afraid to return to recover bodies. That detail suggests the attack was not a brief hit-and-run but the culmination of a longer period of intimidation.
The source also places the raid in a wider pattern of violence across Nigeria. Such attacks are common in remote areas where armed gangs seek control and exploit limited government presence. The report says the gunmen likely used the National Park Forest along Kabe district as a hideout, reflecting a common tactic in which inaccessible terrain gives attackers a temporary advantage.
The attack is especially unsettling because it came near Papiri community, where more than 300 schoolchildren and their teachers were kidnapped from a Catholic school in November. That proximity reinforces the sense that the area is under sustained pressure from organised armed groups.
President Bola Tinubu condemned the attack and ordered security officials to hunt down the gunmen and rescue the hostages, the AP report says. But the evidence also makes clear that the state’s ability to intervene quickly remains limited. What happened in Kasuwan-Daji was another reminder that Nigeria’s rural insecurity is not confined to one state or one criminal network.
This report sticks to what can be confirmed. The final casualty count may rise, more bodies may be recovered and responsibility may eventually be established. For now, the evidence supports one conclusion: a village market raid in Borgu left at least 30 dead, others missing and an entire community devastated.
