Ado-Ekiti – Residents of Oke Ako community in Ikole Local government area of Ekiti state have blamed police in the area for failing to act swiftly on Friday night when the community was thrown into mourning, wailing and gnashing of teeth, by suspected killer herdsmen who invaded the town, leaving two dead and several others wounded.
One of the residents, Muyiwa Olukosi whose wife sustained matchete wound, told newsmen that the case was reported to police in the area stressing that there was no response from them.
Olukosi who maintained that things would have gone worst more than what one could imagine if not for the prompt response of a team of the Nigerian Army from Akure, even before the arrival of police in the area also noted that the attack would have been prevented had the police acted swiftly during the attack.
He called on the Governments at all levels to beef up security in the area in order to avert the re-occurrence of such development.
On the attack another eyewitness told journalists that the incident in which the entire village was sacked occurred at about 8:00 pm on Friday.
A woman, who identified herself as Mrs Grace Olofin, had during in a telephone chat alleged that the killer herdsmen invaded the community in large numbers, caught the people of the community unawares, adding that the invaders were armed with dangerous weapons like automatic guns, bows, arrows, swords, matchetes, hacking and mauling their victims with reckless abandon.
Olofin further alleged majority of the villagers had to scamper for safety in the bushes to escape the onslaught of the killer herdsmen, who according to her were hacking the hapless villagers with their deadly weapons.
She said the invaders had shot sporadically into the air and killed one Lekan Arosanyin and a yet to be identified person, while four others sustained various degrees of injuries and were said to be receiving treatment at a private hospital in Ado Ekiti, the state capital.
Another witness , who narrowly escaped being killed, Adebayo Ajayi, described the incident as a reprisal attack as he said that the herdsmen had previously fallen out with the villagers over their grazing activities in the community.
He further explained that the villagers had been resisting the use of their farmlands as grazing fields by the herdsmen.
The Divisional Police Officer in the area who also spoke on telephone interview confirmed the incident noting that he could not ascertain whether the incident was armed robbery or Fulani herdsmen attack .
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