Residents of Dutsinma Local Government Area of Katsina State, yesterday, staged a protest against the incessant attacks and invasion of their communities by suspected bandits and kidnappers.
As early as 8am, the protesters from Maiturare and Dogon Ruwa villages, near the Federal University, Dutsinma, set up bonfires on the Dutsinma-Kankara road, disrupting vehicular traffic as they chanted anti-government slogans.
An eyewitness said the protesters prevented motorists coming from Zaria, Kaduna and Abuja from plying the road and that those from Katsina managed to make a retreat.
“The bandits continue to attack our communities, they steal our cattle, they rape and take our women hostage,” said one of the protesters.
A staff of the Federal University, Dutsinma, Aliyu Dalha, said the protesters complained of being abandoned by government to the mercy of criminals.
Dalha said he and his colleagues ran into the protests and had to take refuge at the school’s temporary site.
“Along the way, we discovered that the villages along the road, which had received threats from the bandits and received influx of refugee villagers and large herds of livestocks from the inner villages, had mounted road blocks in protest for being abandoned to the mercy of the criminals. They burnt tyres on the highway and condemned both the Federal and Katsina State governments,” he said
