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Terrorist Sect ‘Mahmuda Group’ Launches Contemporary Assault in Kwara, Deepens Safety Disaster Throughout North Central Nigeria
By Amanabo Ocholi | April 19, 2025 | Duruma, Baruten LGA – Kwara State
Concern and rigidity gripped Duruma village (Karonji) in Baruten Native Authorities Space of Kwara State on Friday night following a violent assault by the infamous terrorist group referred to as the Mahmuda Group, a radical splinter cell linked to Boko Haram.
Eyewitnesses informed The Bureau Newspaper that the attackers, numbering over a dozen, arrived on bikes and opened fireplace indiscriminately, sending residents fleeing for his or her lives. The militants additionally set ablaze an area vigilante patrol car and several other bikes, however had been finally repelled by the courageous resistance of the group’s safety volunteers.
“The Mahmuda boys got here within the night and began capturing all over the place. Thank God our vigilante males stood agency. They managed to kill two of the militants,” mentioned an area witness who requested anonymity for security.
A Reign of Terror Throughout Kwara and Niger States
This newest assault is an element of a bigger sample of insurgency by the Mahmuda Group, a jihadist outfit that has entrenched itself throughout the Kainji Lake Nationwide Park (KLNP) and its surrounding communities, utilizing the huge ungoverned area as a launchpad for assaults, extortion, and unlawful actions.
The group’s operations span a number of rural communities in Kaiama Native Authorities Space (Kemaanji, Tenebo, Baabete, Nuku, Nanu) and Baruten LGA (Yashikira District) of Kwara State, in addition to Babana and Wawa Districts in Borgu LGA of Niger State.
Native sources affirm that the group refers to itself because the “Mahmuda Group” or “Mallam Group,” named after its chief, who has circulated audiotapes selling a Sunni Islamist agenda. The recordings reveal that the group sees itself as a average jihadist motion, however its ways mirror these of Boko Haram, together with focused killings, kidnapping for ransom, compelled conscription, and taxation of civilians.
From Displacement to Domination: A Timeline of Violence
The Mahmuda Group’s emergence in KLNP dates again 5 years, following their expulsion from Mokwa Native Authorities Space in Niger State by former Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu, who publicly accused them of being Boko Haram operatives.
After their eviction, they settled briefly in Welele village in Kaiama, however stress from native authorities compelled them into the forests of Kaduna State. Finally, they regrouped and infiltrated the Kainji Nationwide Park, the place they established a base of operations and commenced systematically undermining native governance.
“Since their arrival, the militants have turned KLNP right into a prison empire. They extort cash from herders, farmers, and merchants, run unlawful logging companies, and even act because the de facto authority,” mentioned a civil society activist accustomed to the state of affairs.
How Mahmuda Group Governs Via Concern
Studies from a number of villages point out that the militants impose a parallel authorities, accumulating Zakat (Islamic tax) from herders, assigning farmland to locals in trade for farming levies, and even compelling residents to work on their farms as a type of compelled labor or “Sadaqah.”
Their management goes deeper:
Kidnapping and Ransom: Locals are recurrently kidnapped and ransoms demanded.
Ban on Alcohol & Smoking: All social vices, together with consuming and smoking, are strictly prohibited.
Non secular Enforcement: Periodic spiritual sermons are delivered to indoctrinate locals and promote loyalty to their Islamist ideology.
Dispute Decision: The group settles conflicts between villagers, bypassing the Nigerian justice system.
Crackdown on Conventional Herbalists: Suspected of aiding vigilantes, herbalists are intimidated or eradicated.
Unlawful Mining & Logging: The militants facilitate large-scale deforestation and doable mining operations, unchecked by the federal government.
“We live beneath their rule,” a distressed farmer informed The Bureau. “Even our personal vigilantes typically have to barter with them to rescue kidnapped individuals.”
Failed Safety Structure and Suspected Authorities Silence
The militants’ grip on this area raises severe questions concerning the Nigerian authorities’s capacity — or willingness — to confront terrorism in rural areas. Regardless of occupying such a important ecological and strategic zone as KLNP, there was no sustained navy offensive to reclaim the world.
Some imagine the group’s continued survival is made doable by inside sabotage or silent complicity from highly effective actors.
“The extent of weapons they possess makes it clear: somebody highly effective is backing them, or no less than wanting the opposite method,” an area supply speculated.
In December, over 15 vigilantes and villagers had been killed in Kemanji, throughout one other assault by the Mahmuda Group — a sign that the disaster is escalating and should quickly unfold past the present territory.
A Ticking Time Bomb
The North Central area, as soon as thought of extra secure than the conflict-ridden Northeast, is now dealing with a rising insurgency. The Mahmuda Group, empowered by native recruitment, illicit finance, and geographical benefit, poses a severe menace to regional and nationwide safety.
With out instant, decisive motion from the Nigerian Armed Forces, the Division of State Providers (DSS), and the Workplace of the Nationwide Safety Adviser (ONSA), extra communities might fall beneath terrorist rule — leaving 1000’s on the mercy of militants inside Nigeria’s borders.
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