Between Tuesday and Wednesday, no fewer than 30 lives were lost in a brutal attack on some residents of Mangu Local Government Area of Plateau State, and different narratives have been spun as the reason for the attack.

FIJ learned that contrary to what many have claimed to be the origin of the attack, the violence commenced on Monday, when some Fulani men attacked two Mangu individuals on a bike near a military checkpoint.

A Youth Peace Ambassador in the community, who asked to be anonymous, told FIJ that the Christians in Mangu took umbrage after some Fulani men killed one of them, injured another and destroyed the bike conveying the two without the military intervening.

In response, aggrieved Christian residents dismantled the checkpoint the following day and launched a reprisal in Deng-Kong where the Fulanis reside, seeking justice for their fellow community members.

“In retaliation, people of my extraction began to wonder why Fulani was in Mangu Town after destroying the villages. So, there was a reprisal. My people tried to pursue them. As they did, the Muslim indigenes of the Mwaghavul and Pyem people started burning the houses of the Christian Mwaghavul within them in the Sabon Kasawa area. This led to the declaration of the 24-hour curfew,” Samuel told FIJ.

He said that by Wednesday morning, the issue had resurfaced and escalated again, such that all the Christian dwellings within the Muslim-dominated area in Mwaghavul were caught up in the crossfire before it then escalated to other places.

“There are reports that more than 10 mosques have been burned, but it is untrue. The mosques were in an area dominated by Christians. The two are inside Bungha, in the Christian-dominated area. The mosques they claimed were burned are in a Muslim-dominated area, so who burned them? Only two were burned. They burned one church around Sabon-Kasawa and one prayer house. A small church in the Mangu market was burned, as were two other churches,” he said.

“The perception of farmer-herder clashes is disappointing. Mangu, Bokkos, Riyom, Bassa, and Birkin Ladi, and part of Jos South – the agrarian areas with enough area for irrigation – are so fertile, so they want to get the land; that is why these places get the heat of the land-grabbing issues.”

He also blamed the military, stating that their attempts at labelling the residents complaining about their men as untrue are appalling.

“Until the military acknowledges and takes responsibility for the allegations of their men, this issue won’t stop. A military person shot and killed someone in my community, Angwan Seriki, on Wednesday. They cut the hand of someone in my community with a gunshot wound. When they came to my community, my people said that we didn’t need them and that they should go to our neighbouring community with serious issues needing intervention.”

“They beat up a boy. We don’t know why. Women protested, and they started beating them too. They started stoning them, and the army started firing shots at them. But they came out and denied it.”