Tiffany Wertheimer,<\/span><\/p>\n Makuochi Okafor<\/span>and<\/span><\/p>\n BBC Hausa<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n Armed men have violently stormed a village in Nigeria’s Niger state, killing at least 30 people and looting shops, state authorities have said.<\/p>\n The attackers emerged from a forest near the village of Kasuwan-Daji on Saturday and set fire to the local market, looted shops and kidnapped an unspecified number of people, police said.<\/p>\n “The gunmen entered the town on motorcycles carrying weapons, rounded up people and then proceeded to slaughter them, while others were shot dead,” a local journalist told the BBC’s Hausa service.<\/p>\n Attacks and kidnappings by armed criminal gangs, known as bandits, have been a problem in Nigeria for years, but reports in western and central regions have spiked recently.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Abdullahi Rofia, an official with the Niger State Emergency Management Agency, confirmed the journalist’s report that villagers were rounded up and killed.<\/p>\n He told the BBC that people in the community were terrified: “They are hiding, they are too afraid to talk to anybody.<\/p>\n “They are scared that if you talk, they will turn and do the same to you.”<\/p>\n Niger state police spokesperson, Wasiu Abiodun, said an emergency team has been deployed to help the injured and security forces are working to rescue those kidnapped. <\/p>\n It is illegal to pay ransom money to the criminal groups, which the government has classified as terrorists, but there are claims this is often ignored.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n A witness to the attack told BBC Hausa that there were no security forces in the village. <\/p>\n “We want the government to help us. In the past, we used to hear about this problem in other places, but now it is happening in our villages,” he said.<\/p>\n The fear is driving people from their homes where they were born and raised.<\/p>\n “We are dying like chickens, and does the government care about us? <\/p>\n “The government hears and sees what is happening, but it is not doing anything about it. What can we do as ordinary people?”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"Zakari](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/f487\/live\/67759550-e975-11f0-8d69-9f0dae13c5ba.jpg.webp\")
Zakari Kontagora<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n![](\"https:\/\/static.files.bbci.co.uk\/bbcdotcom\/web\/20251210-151139-37baf2dfdd-web-2.36.1-1\/grey-placeholder.png\")
![\"Zakari](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/0475\/live\/fa501390-e976-11f0-8d69-9f0dae13c5ba.jpg.webp\")
Zakari Kontagora<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
![\"Zakari](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/3010\/live\/3f27fa50-e977-11f0-8d69-9f0dae13c5ba.jpg.webp\")