Suspected Boko Haram insurgents pounced on rice plantations around Zabarmari and Koshebe communities, last Saturday evening, killing four farmers and burned their corpses.
The communities are about 10 kilometers at the outskirts of Maiduguri metropolis.
The suspected insurgents had, on December 1, invaded some of the plantations, razing down hundreds of hectares of rice farms, including hundreds of tonnes of the harvested farm produce.
“They [suspected insurgents] invaded our plantations again at about 6pm last Saturday, and again, set ablaze hundreds of hectares of our rice farms, brutally gunned down four of our fellow farmers, heaped grasses on the corpses and burned them,” Alhaji Hassan Mohammed, Chairman of Zabarmari Rice Farmers Association, told 9news on Monday.
“We grow rice, guinea corn, millet and various fruits in the expansive plantations,” the leading rice farmer said, adding that, “we had been planning for the dry season farming which has set in; the bulk of the quantity of the food produced in Borno comes from here; but we are scared now.”
He pleaded: “Government should please come to our rescue by providing more security to enable us practice dry season farming.”
There is a rising spate of attacks by the suspected insurgents on military formations and communities, killing tens of troops and civilians in Borno State over the last one week, according to 9news investigations.
