Gunmen blow up Catholic Church in Taraba

Some gunmen blew up at the Catholic Chapel of St. John’s College, Mutum-Biyu, the headquarters of Gassol local government.

This is coming less than 24 hours after bandits in a military uniform killed three relations of the village head of Wuro Bokki village in Gassol Local Government area of Taraba State.

The Principal of the College, Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Vershima, who confirmed the incident said: “We thank God no life was lost, but the Church has been destroyed. Like 10 minutes after the explosion in the school, we started hearing gunshots in the town.

“The youths and some students were holding a programme in the chapel which double as the school hall and left the premises shortly before the explosion.

“This is a religious premises and if attacks like these are happening to the Church, where will people run to?

“I want to call for a thorough investigation to unravel those behind the attack and the perpetrators brought to book,” he said.

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Taraba State Police Command’s Public Relations Officer, DSP. Abdullahi Usman confirmed the attack in a telephone interview with our correspondent.

“Usman said, “what happened was that some kidnappers came to kidnap the owner of one filling station in the town, unfortunately for them, they could not achieve their mission.

“In the process of running to escape begin trapped, they started shooting sporadically to escape.

“It was in the process that they threw an explosive into the church to cause fear to enable them to escape. The explosion blew up and caused some damages to the building,” he said.

Terna Chikpa