Grief hung heavily in the air as the Zike community in Bassa Local Government Area of Plateau State laid to rest 51 of its residents brutally murdered in a pre-dawn attack that has once again cast a dark shadow over the troubled region.

The victims, mostly women and children, were gunned down in the early hours of Monday when yet-to-be-identified assailants stormed the sleepy village, firing indiscriminately. The massacre is the latest in a string of violent assaults that have plagued Plateau State in recent times.

At the mass burial held in the community, emotions ran high as families, friends, and sympathizers wept uncontrollably. Traditional mourners draped in black wailed as the victims’ coffins were lowered into the earth — a harrowing scene that has become all too familiar in the region.

Speaking at the funeral, a visibly distraught community leader, Davidson Malison, described the attack as “disheartening” and lamented the scale of the devastation.

“I can tell you the situation is very disheartening,” Malison said. “We are still searching for more corpses. Something needs to be done to put an end to this.”

The Irigwe women leader, Mary Dikwa, echoed similar concerns, calling on the government to step up its responsibility in securing lives and property.

“They have been killing us in this our community,” Dikwa said in tears. “Several times they will come and attack us. This situation has gone out of hand.”

Monday’s carnage came barely two weeks after another deadly assault left over 50 people dead and several others severely injured, despite repeated reassurances by the government to restore peace to the North-Central state.

Reacting to the renewed wave of violence, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu ordered security agencies to track down the perpetrators and bring them to justice.

“I have instructed security agencies to thoroughly investigate this crisis and identify those responsible for orchestrating these violent acts,” the President said in a statement released by his spokesman, Bayo Onanuga. “We cannot allow this devastation and the tit-for-tat attacks to continue. Enough is enough.”

As the Zike community mourns yet another loss, residents are left clinging to hope — that someday soon, peace will return to their land and they can finally bury their dead without fearing for the lives of the living.

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The remains of far-famed Nigerian Prophet Temitope Joshua, better known as T. B Joshua have been buried amid tears from his admirers, teeming followers and public figures. 

The burial took place at the Synagogue Church of All Nations (SCOAN) in Lagos after an interment service attended by dignitaries including Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State.

Friday’s burial was the culmination of a week-long funeral rites that attracted hoards of people across the globe.

His followers regarded him as charismatic and down-to-earth. Photo: Emmanuel TV.

The  preacher’s body arrived at the SCOAN premises in the Ikotun-Egbe area of Lagos on Thursday.

An umbrella organisation comprising of  numerous Christian denominations, – the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), which  previously had a frosty relationship with the late cleric , sent a delegation to the burial but many mega-pastors in Africa’s most populous nation were absent.

It was also observed that outside the SCOAN premises, many flags belonging to different nations were flown at half-mast.

The mourners came from the Caribbean and South Africa, among others, a reflection of T.B Joshua’s followership which stretched beyond the Nigerian borders.

Hundreds of residents in the Ikotun area lined the streets on Thursday to watch T. B Joshua’s  hearse.

Although many of them are not members of his mega-church, but, they have been impacted by the preacher’s charitable works and the industry created by SCOAN.

Paying tribute to the Ondo-born televangelist who rose to prominence in the 1990s, Governor Akeredolu described TB Joshua’s death as a loss to humanity.

He noted that the preacher who attracted thousands of worshippers to his mega-church was a special breed, admitting that the mammoth crowd that attended his burial eclipsed what was recorded during the funeral of South Africa’s foremost freedom fighter, Nelson Mandela.

Prophet T.B. Joshua had a teeming followership that stretched beyond Nigeria’s borders.

His words. “I’m not too sure we’ve had the world so congregated in this number from different countries in many such services, maybe, that of Nelson Mandela but the world is more represented here than when Nelson Mandela was buried.

“Indeed, it was and is being globally acknowledged today by all of us”, the governor said of Prophet T B Joshua, who was credited with predicting some global events.

T.B Joshua died on June 5th in Lagos after holding a church service. The cause of his death is unknown.

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