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Posted By Admin On June 5th, 2022

Gunmen attacked a Catholic church in Ondo state, Nigeria, during mass on Sunday, leaving dozens dead, in a “satanic attack” local officials said.

The attackers targeted the St Francis Xavier Catholic Church in the town of Owo just as the worshippers gathered on Pentecost Sunday, state legislator Ogunmolasuyi Oluwole said.

Among the dead were many children, he said. Videos appearing to be from the scene of the attack showed church worshippers lying in pools of blood while people around them wailed.

Adelegbe Timileyin, who represents the Owo area in Nigeria’s lower legislative chamber, said the presiding priest was abducted as well. The governor of Ondo state, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, condemned the “vile and satanic attack” on Sunday and pledged to find the assailants, amid outcry and shock in Nigeria at the killings.

A doctor at a hospital in Owo, a town in the southwestern state, told Reuters: “Several worshippers were brought in dead.”

Sunday Ajibola, a volunteer at one of the town’s hospitals said he saw “nothing less than 50 dead bodies” and several others with injuries from bullets and explosives being treated by medics. Local hospitals were making urgent appeals for donations of blood, he said.

Local media said the gunmen had fired at worshippers and detonated explosives at the church.

Funmilayo Ibukun Odunlami, a police spokesperson for Ondo state, did not immediately confirm who was behind the attacks, saying, “There was an incident today at the St Francis Catholic church in Owo” and police would issue a statement soon.

Yet Olayemi Adeyemi, a lawmaker in Ondo said it was believed to have been carried out by ethnic Fulani terrorists, sometimes referred to as bandits, that have staged relentless attacks predominantly in northern Nigeria as well as other parts of the country.

The terrorist groups emerged from a historic conflict between pastoralists and local communities over access to land and encroachments on private farms, and have carried out mass killings and kidnappings, exploiting a lack of rural security across the country and leaving several communities helpless.

Adeyemi said the attack was likely in retaliation to recent restrictions by the state government on grazing in Ondo State, including in forests where the assailants have carried out attacks. The restrictions were adopted after an upsurge in kidnaps in Ondo State.

“We have enjoyed improved security since herdsmen were driven away from our forests by this administration,” Adeyemi said. “This is a reprisal attack to send a diabolical message to the governor.”

While much of Nigeria has struggled with security issues, Ondo has been one of the country’s more peaceful states until the last few years, when kidnappings and attacks linked to herder-farmer conflicts have risen.

The Ondo state governor, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, said he was heading back to the state from the capital, Abuja, after the “unprovoked attack and killing of innocent people of Owo”.

“We shall commit every available resource to hunt down these assailants and make them pay,” he said in a statement.

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