By MARYAM SULEIMAN BELLO, Kaduna

Bandits have stormed the Dan-Honu II community in New Millennium City, a suburb of Kaduna in part of Chikum Local Government Area of Kaduna State.

Among those abducted were a new couple who got married last Saturday, the Imam of the community mosque, his wife, and three children, including a 10-month-old baby.

Sources disclosed that the bandits stormed the community around 9: 05pm, numbering about 15, with AK47 rifles and other dangerous weapons. They were said to be clad in black and hooded.

Mohammed Danjuma and escapee said the bandits started by picking the clergy man (leader of the community mosque) and his family, whom they met outside the community Juma’at Mosque, before proceeding to a four-flat compound where they picked the new couple.

“I was inside my own apartment when the bandits stormed our compound. At first, when they started banging on the new couple’s door because they went straight to their apartment, I thought they were security people who came to arrest my neighbour.

“They started banging on his door and shouting, ‘Dan Iska ba za ka fito ba?’, meaning, ‘idiot, will you not come out? That was when I realised that they were kidnappers. So, when they could not force the door open, they broke his window and broke the burglary proof.

“On gaining entrance into the apartment, the bandits tried to open the door, but they could not open it. So, they brought the couple out through the broken window. They injured the husband, and blood was dripping out of his body.

“Then they made an attempt to enter my own apartment too. They had broken the glass window, but as they were busy hitting the burglary proof to break into my apartment, one of the vigilantes in the community fired a shot into the air, which made the bandits became uncomfortable and left our compound,” Danjumma added.

Malam Suleiman the clergy and his neighbour Malam Musa, who was picked while they were relaxing with Arabian tea outside the mosque premises where he is leading congressional prayers was reported to have escaped while they were being led out of the community into the bush.

“A new bride, who was said to have gone through surgery recently, was abandoned in the bush by the kidnappers when she could not cope with the pace of their trekking in the bush.

“Imam’s wife was also let go when her baby’s cry almost exposed the bandits to vigilantes around Kakura”, Saminu Tijjani, a resident of the area, told our reporter.

“The bandits eventually succeeded in going away with the new groom, identified as Ibrahim, and two of the imam’s children (15-year-old Abba and his younger brother). They were yet to establish contact with the family as of the time of filing this report”, Tijjani added.

Narrating his short ordeal in the hands of the bandits, the clergy, Suleiman said two of the seven bandits who abducted them were armed with AK47 rifles with chains of bullets, while others carried axes, machetes, and sticks.

“They beat the 10-month-old baby because he was crying. They even threatened to kill him, saying that his cry was disturbing them.

“But I thank God that my wife and the baby later escaped after I had escaped, but they (bandits) went away with my two others”, Suleiman narrated.

When contacted, the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of Kaduna Command, ASP Mansur Hassan, said the police are still trying to establish the true account of the incident.