Reported by: Ijeoma G | Edited by: Oravbiere Osayomore Promise.
New airstrike allegedly kills at least 13 civilians in Niger State, military insists operation was precise and targeted only bandits. By dawn, a father had buried three children and a village was asking the same question it has asked for years: how many more?
The bomb came with the first light of dawn. Victor Solomon was asleep in his home in Guradnayi village, near Kusasu town in Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, when the earth erupted around 5 a.m. on Sunday. When he opened his eyes, his face was shredded by shrapnel. Around him, the bodies of his children lay still. “I don’t know if I can survive this,” he later told Daily Trust from his hospital bed, his voice barely audible. “I lost three of my children.”
The Nigerian military said it was targeting bandits. The Nigerian Army UAV Command, acting on intelligence reports of armed bandits massing in the area, conducted multiple air interdiction strikes between 11:59 p.m. on Saturday and 6 a.m. on Sunday across several villages, including Katerma, Bokko, Kusasu and Kuduru. The Defence Headquarters later claimed that approximately 70 bandits were killed in Kusasu alone, and that the strikes were “precise on target.” But on the ground, while the military celebrated a successful operation, the people of Guradnayi were digging graves.
Residents say military aircraft were pursuing bandits who had been seen riding through the area on motorcycles. “The military first dropped a bomb near the river in Kusasu,” one resident told Premium Times. “The second bomb was dropped in Guradnayi.” That second bomb landed on homes. Gideon Bamaiyi, speaking by telephone, told Daily Trust that 13 people, including seven children who were taking shelter in his elder brother’s house, were killed in the airstrike. “Nobody survived,” he said. “My elder brother had already left the house when the incident happened; otherwise, he would have been a victim too.”
Auta Awododo, a resident of Kusasu, said one of those killed was his cousin’s son. He estimated that 12 people died in his relative’s house alone. “The rest were Kusasu people who were fleeing from the terrorists,” he told Daily Post. Another 13 civilian deaths were reported by community sources, including many women and children who had already been displaced by earlier violence and had sought refuge in the village. The injured are being treated at a private hospital in Zumba, where doctors are demanding N400,000 for surgery on one female victim, whose family cannot afford it.
The military has denied any civilian casualties. In a statement issued Sunday night, the Director of Defence Media Operations, Major General Michael Onoja, insisted that all local civilians had voluntarily relocated to Sarkin Pawa, a nearby town, before the operation commenced. “This fact alone fundamentally undermines the claim that innocent residents were present in the strike zones at the time of the operation,” he said. He described reports of civilian deaths as “unverified accounts” and urged the media to exercise restraint.
But residents of Guradnayi and Kusasu say the military’s account is false. They say after the bandits passed through the area, many villagers who had fled earlier returned home, believing the danger had passed. “The airstrike occurred around 5 a.m. when people were still sleeping,” Gideon Bamaiyi said. Victor Solomon was asleep. His children were asleep. None of them had received any warning.
This is not the first time Shiroro has counted civilian bodies after a military airstrike. In 2022, a Nigerian Air Force fighter jet killed six minors in Kurebe village. Five months later, another airstrike killed eight civilians in the same village. None of those cases were ever resolved. The Air Force disputed the killings. The pattern is seared into the memory of every resident: bandits move through, the military responds with bombs, and when the smoke clears, the dead are civilians and the military denies everything.
As of Monday morning, the Nigerian Air Force had not issued an official statement on the incident. Its spokesperson did not respond to enquiries. Meanwhile, the same bandits the military claimed to have neutralised have already regrouped. A security source confirmed that the armed group later moved from Kusasu into neighbouring Munya Local Government Area, where they are reportedly still operating. “As I speak to you now, they are operating in Kabula near Kuchi,” the source said. “There is no confirmed report of abduction or killings yet, but they have rustled many cattle from many communities in Munya.”
Victor Solomon, who lost three children, still lay in his hospital bed on Monday morning, his face wrapped in bandages, staring at a ceiling he never expected to see again. “I sustained severe injuries to my face. I am in pain. We need help from the government,” he said. His three children cannot be helped. Neither can the seven children who died in Gideon Bamaiyi’s brother’s house. The bombs that were supposed to stop the killing have only added to the count.
The military has said that relevant formations have been directed to verify allegations of civilian casualties. But in Shiroro, where the same accusations have followed every airstrike for years, residents have stopped waiting for verification. They are waiting for the next bomb.
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