…as survivors give accounts amidst mass burial of unlucky victims in unbefitting graves
By Sanni Abdullahi, George Wang and Ime Silas
The night air in Kum village, Riyom Local Government Area of Plateau State, was shattered by gunshots, screams, and silence. By dawn, what remained was a trail of bodies, shattered homes, and a father left to tell a story no parent should ever have to tell.
According to accounts shared by survivors and recounted publicly by former Minister of Youth and Sports, Solomon Dalung Esq., attackers stormed the village in a coordinated assault that left entire families wiped out. Among the dead was a two-month-old baby, women, and children who were asleep in their rooms when the violence began.
The details emerging from the massacre have left residents and observers across Plateau State shaken. Dalung, who said he read the survivors’ testimonies with “goosebumps,” described the incident as the kind of tragedy “that should trouble the conscience of any human being.”
“Today you will learn a hard lesson”
In the lone survivor’s testimony reproduced by Dalung, the father described how the attackers first came asking for the “father of the house.”
“Person chasing me got close,” he said. “Then after about 30 minutes, I heard the dogs barking again and then sounds of boots again. Then I heard gunshots at my son’s door followed by the sound of the door being kicked open.”
He continued: “Then I heard my son saying, ‘please don’t harm us.’ But a male voice with a Fulani accent said in Hausa, ‘today you will learn a hard lesson’ after demanding the ‘father of the house.’ When my son failed to answer, they shot him, shot his wife and shot his two-month-old baby.”
In desperation, the father said he threw his six-year-old daughter through a window and ran into the bush as shots rang out behind him. When the attacker lost him, the man returned to the house.
“I tried to crawl back, but before I got 20 meters close, they went to the next room where my six daughters were sleeping and I heard automatic gunfire everywhere followed by silence,” he recounted.
The horror did not end there. “Then they started marching out of the house. One of my daughters, a four-year-old who was apparently terrified, screamed, and one of the attackers marched back and shot her.”
By the time soldiers arrived, he said he was able to return to find his wife, his son and his wife, their two-month-old daughter, and his six daughters lying dead.
Mass burial and unbefitting graves
In the aftermath, Kum village was left to bury its dead in hurried, mass graves. Community members described the burials as “unbefitting,” done in grief and haste, without the rites and dignity families would have wished for their loved ones.
For many in Riyom and across Plateau, the images of shrouded bodies and fresh mounds of earth have become a grim, recurring sight. Homes have been razed. Children have been orphaned. Parents have been forced to bury their own children.
“As someone from Plateau State, I just feel totally exhausted and sick of all these,” Dalung wrote. “These are communities who have lived with the fear and trauma of repeated attacks for years… and a lot more communities are left wondering when the next tragedy will come.”
A demand for justice, not statements
Beyond the mourning, there is anger. Survivors and community leaders say what they need now is not another round of condolence visits or press statements that fade after a few days.
“What these survivors deserve is justice,” Dalung stated. “Not temporary press statements and some handful visits by government officials that disappears after a few days, but a serious commitment to finding those responsible, prosecuting them, and ensuring that communities are protected.”
He argued that no society can claim to value human life “while innocent people continue to be attacked and their killers remain unknown or unaccountable.”
The call resonates across Plateau, a state that has endured cycles of violence for years. Villages in Riyom, Barkin Ladi, Bassa, and Jos South have all recorded similar attacks — night raids, mass casualties, and communities displaced.
For the people of Kum, the trauma is fresh. Children who should have been sleeping peacefully were “caught in a horror they could never understand,” Dalung noted. Families that had lived together for generations were erased in minutes.
“Every Nigerian deserves to sleep without fear”
As burial rites continue and survivors try to pick up pieces of their lives, the demand remains simple: peace and security.
“The people of Plateau state deserve peace,” Dalung said. “Every Nigerian deserves to sleep without fear that darkness will bring death to their doorstep.”
Security agencies have yet to release a full official statement on the Kum attack. Residents say they are waiting to see if this time will be different — if investigations will be thorough, if arrests will be made, and if the presence of security forces will translate into lasting protection.
For now, in Kum village, the evidence of that night remains in the quiet rooms, the broken windows, and the fresh graves. And in the voice of one father, the only survivor of his home, who ran into the bush with a daughter in his arms and returned to find the rest of his family gone.
The story of Kum is not just about one village. It is about a pattern that has repeated too many times, and about a people asking, again, when the killings will stop.
