Emmanuel Iortile, a fisherman and indigene of Taraba State, lost two brothers in a broad day light to trigger-happy Jukun youths in Takum Local Government Area of the state.
The siblings were shot in his very eyes, one after the other. According to him, his escape was miraculous. Similar bizarre cases are taking place on a daily basis across the country. Iortile narrated his narrow escape to our correspondent in Jalingo.
Below is the story as told by him:
On the first day of May 2019, my two younger brothers asked me to convey them on my motorcycle to River Fete, in Takum Local Government Area of Taraba State to do some fishing. They needed money for a programme that was to hold Sunday of that week; so, they wanted to go to the river to fish, which they hoped to sell thereafter.
I rode on my motorcycle to Fete area where some Jukun guys stopped us and asked who we were.
We told them we are Tiv, and that we came to fish in River Fete.
They searched us but what they found was our fishing instrument. They said they were not convinced, that people have been terrorising the area and we could be among them.
They marched us to the chief of Fete whose name I don’t know. The chief collected our motorcycle. I was having a wallet that contained two thousand (N2,500) which the Jukun guys collected before we reached the chief’s palace.
The chief actually asked us our mission to Fete which we told him.
He was as well not convinced. He claimed a lady who was staying with them was taken away by some Tiv guys who came to them and lied that the lady’s family requested her presence.
He said, as soon as they left with her, she was nowhere to be located as she could not be reached anywhere, even on phone.
He asked some people who he said were vigilantes to take us to the police in Takum for further interrogation.
But to my greatest surprise, some guys started beaten us, it took the intervention of some of them for them to leave us at that moment.
They tired us up and before they could finish, a White Hilux van belonging to the council chairman of Takum Local Government, drove in.
Though the chairman, Shiban Tikari, was not in the vehicle, his personal driver was the one driving the hilux van.
They put us in the vehicle and covered it with tarpaulin. On the way to Takum, the tarpaulin opened on the other side of the vehicle due to the heavy wind.
I was able to see outside. They immediately entered a bush and I told my brothers that these people were taking us to be killed.
They went deep inside the bush and stopped. They removed my immediate younger brother Dzeeyum Iortile; they advanced with him and I heard a gunshot.
They came back and took Tersoo, who is the same father with me. They advanced as well and they also shot him.
They came the third time; this time it was my turn. They brought me out and untied me, I asked them to allow me pray before they would kill me but one of them refused that until I get to where my two brothers were killed.
We advanced to the place where I saw my two brothers lay dead.
I knelt down and started praying and immediately, my spirit told me to run. I took off as directed by my spirit; they shot everywhere as I was running but God protected me. My escape has remained a wonder to me, because I cannot really explained what really happened and why the bullets the guys were firing could not touch me.
Later, it was alleged that my brothers who had been killed were armed robbers. But it is not true. In the process of running into the bush, I traced down to where my sister is married in one of the villages around Takum.
The area is where I stayed for over five years; so, I know it very well.
When I got there, I narrated what happened. Already, the chief of the area had summoned the community to check why there were heavy gunshots in the area.
It was the villagers who went on search and discovered the two young men dead in the bush.
While on the way, they saw the Hilux van that conveyed us to the bush. When they discovered that the people in the Hilux did something evil, they called some members of their group who were behind to block the Hilux van and as well alerted the military in Takum which was able to intercept the vehicle and arrested two of the killers, while two others escaped.
Nathaniel Gbaoron, Jalingo
