I GO EVERYWHERE WITH MY GUNS, EVEN THE TOILET

I am from Sabon Garin Gangara. I escaped being the first person to be killed in my community.

There was a time when all the cattle in our community and neighbouring communities were rustled by the bandits. Then, I was rearing cattle for my boss and they were the only cattle left in the community.

One day I went to the outskirts to graze; unknown to me, bandits were approaching where I was. I was sitting down late in the evening while the cattle were eating grass. I just saw people flashing torch lights at me and surrounding me from all angles and I said, “Innalillahi wa’inna ilaihi raji’un.” I started running and all the cattle followed me because they were well-trained. The bandits kept following me and shooting, but it would only sound and nothing would happen to me. Their boss shouted, “Wai baku harbeshi? (Why don’t you shoot him?)” The boys responded, “Oga, takiya (It can’t work).” And the boss said, “Use a machete and kill him.” But it also couldn’t work on me. I managed to escape.

This happened to me five to six times. After the last incident, my family decided not to allow me to go again and a decision was reached to bring back the cattle to the main Katsina town where my boss lived.

Insha Allah, as of then, the only way bandits could go with those cattle was by ensuring I was dead. I’m sure their gunshot cannot do anything to me.

The sixth time they chased me, I was running and they kept following from around 9 pm until 7 am in the morning. That’s the hardest and longest run of my life.

There is no type of hardship I didn’t endure from those criminals. One day, they invaded our community and abducted my wife eight days after giving birth to a baby boy. They took her along with my brother’s wife and two children.

They spent 70 days in captivity, and we were planning to raise money for their ransom. Luckily enough, with God’s intervention, they managed to escape.

The bandits were busy eating food and my wife connived with some victims – about 13 of them – and ran. They kept running from around 7 pm till Subhi time the next morning. They found a community nearby called Dumburun to seek help and they were offered pap and beans cake to eat. Later, they were brought to Batsari LGA and we were informed of their escape. They were brought home and we provided them with all the necessary medications to ensure they were alright. 

A few days later, the bandits came back and attacked us, abducting me and my friend. It was around 10:30 pm. When taken to their camp, they chained two of us in our legs using the same chain. I told my friend that so far as it was this chain they tied us with, God would free us, in shaa Allah.

They left and left us. Immediately they left, the chain scattered and we started running to find our way. While running, a dog kept barking at us. That’s when they realised we were trying to escape and one motorcycle followed us. We found a very bushy place and hid there. As they arrived, they kept shooting sporadically in the place we hid, and I told my friend that nothing would happen unless they set us ablaze, but if it’s gunshots, he should not be scared. Some of them were saying we were not inside and that even if we were inside, by now we would be dead.

They left and we came out and kept running until the morning, around 11 am. We also came across a community; the residents helped us and brought us to Batsari LGA, where we received medication and other first aid treatments.

When we arrived home, we kept preparing to protect our community in case they came back. Currently, as I’m talking to you, I have three locally made guns. One can shoot ten times, one eight times and the other one six times.

Last week they invaded a community close to us called Yan Gayya. They snatched phones worth two million naira because the community members don’t have weapons to protect themselves. They had them initially, but they later dropped them because of dialogue and they are now facing the wrath of the bandits. Sometimes, bandits operate with only one gun. If it’s like that, I will not even go. I will send my errand boy to them and he will finish the work.

I choose to take weapons to protect my community and my family’s integrity. Many times, bandits have killed the people we love and cherish most, and have even exploited our wives and hunted our lives. This is the reason we have taken up arms to protect ourselves.

For me, as I’m speaking to you now, I would rather kill a bandit than kill a bird. I will pity a bird more than a bandit.

Another reason is that I have a younger brother I love so much who got married. A year after the wedding, they killed him. I have a neighbour I enjoyed living with; they also killed him. Both of them were slaughtered and when I got to their room to bring out their corpses, the blood filled the room up to my feet. This is why I don’t pity any bandits.

I killed a lot of them, which I can’t mention. If you can visit my community, I will show you some evidence. I have trousers and shirts that are torn all over the front because of bullets. No matter how they shoot, bullets can only tear my clothes, not my body.

I’ve vowed that there will be no day when my shirt will tear from the back, which means I will never run from bandits’ bullets. I would rather face them than run away. 

Another person I lost is a colleague in this work. I still cry because of the loss. One time, we went for an operation in a bandit community. We were exchanging fire with them from 8 in the morning till late evening, around 5 pm. No food, no water. A colleague chased a bandit into a house, unknown to him that many of them were inside, including women. So, they connived with the women and other bandits inside. They tied him up and used stones and many things to scatter his head and killed him. We fought back and returned with his corpse. So, I’m still missing him because he is one of the most gallant and fearless people we have.

For now, I’m addicted to my weapons, which I can’t leave or drop. If I’m in my community, even in the toilet, I used to go with it. And I will never drop it.

Throughout all this, I’ve not been injured. In over 20 years, I’ve not had any injury related to iron. Any gun, machete, or iron-related weapon cannot do anything to me. Recently, I had an incident while working that surprised me when a hoe hit and injured me. I said this was a historical event because in over 20 years, nothing like that had happened to me.

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As narrated by: Nura Abubakar – 35 (Sabon Garin Gangara, Batsari, Katsina).

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This snippet is published as part of the series, What We Lost to the Bandits.