Boko Haram fighters have reportedly abducted hundreds of people including women and children across Northern Adamawa State.

Residents who escaped from the area said at least 50 young women were seized by the insurgents in Gulak town on Saturday after the victims were assembled at a preaching ground.

A resident who identified himself simply as Tija for fear being targeted said he got the news of the abduction while he was being trapped in a village near Gulak before his subsequent escape on Sunday.

He revealed that the victims, including married women, were loaded on to trucks and taken away despite passionate pleading with the insurgents to spare them.

“Some women brought the news that Boko Haram forcefully took some of them away, including a sister in law to a friend of mine. The situation is getting worse by the day, our hope is that this problem will end one day,” he stated.

A resident of Husra village in Michika Local Government Area, Musa Uba, said able-bodied young men had been conscripted by the insurgents to join the Boko Haram sect when preaching efforts failed to bring forth volunteers.

“They conducted preaching sessions to attract converts to their sect but people only listened out of fear. They next day they asked if anybody wanted to join them but there was no response, so they selected many healthy-looking young men and asked them to go with them. One of the victims is my relative who did body building exercise regularly,” he stated.

The Chairman of Madagali Local Council, James Watharda, could not be reached for comments, but a security source confirmed the incident to our correspondent, saying: “They often called women to collect food items at the secretariat of Madagali Local Government in Gulak town. On Saturday they selected some of them and took them away. Abduction is taking place throughout the areas controlled by the insurgents.”

Also a politician in the area, Maina Ularamu, said: “The information I have is that they selected some women and locked them in the local government Secretariat.”

•Excerpted from a Daily Trust report. Photo shows Boko Haram insurgents.