Nigeria: 168 People Unaccounted for One Week after Train Terror Attack

At least 168 passengers of a Nigerian train targeted in a terror attack last week as it traveled from Nigeria’s national capital region, Abuja, to Kaduna state, “have yet to be accounted for,” Nigeria’s Premium Times online newspaper reported on Monday.

The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) recently said “its manifest showed that there were 362 passengers on board” the train in question, which was derailed by unidentified terrorists on March 28.

“Many Nigerians, however, believe the [passenger] figures are much higher due to the fraud and manipulations that go on at the train stations,” the Premium Times noted of the NRC’s allegedly corrupt management of the state-owned rail line.

The NRC said on April 3 it had “confirmed the safety of 14 more passengers on board the train, bringing the total number of safe passengers to 186.”

“Of the remaining 176 passengers, eight have been confirmed dead, while the families of 22 passengers have formally declared them missing. This indicates that a total of 168 passengers have yet to be accounted for, including the 22 declared missing by their families,” according to the Premium Times.

“It is not yet clear if all the 168 were kidnapped by the attackers or have just not been accounted for one week after the incident,” the online publication noted.

Nigeria’s This Day newspaper reported on March 29 that the Abuja-Kaduna rail line carried 970 passengers at the time of its attack on March 28.

A group of unidentified terrorists “used explosives to first blow up the rail track before opening fire on the train,” NRC Chief Executive Fidet Okhiria told reporters on March 29, as quoted by the Associated Press (AP).

“Many people are also feared to have been abducted,” he said at the time.

“They bombed the track and started exchanging fire with the security inside the train,” a survivor of the attack named Abdulwadud Ahmad told the AP on March 29. “They subdued the security, then came into the train and kidnapped a lot of people.”

Nigeria’s train attack last week was one of three major terror incidents that occurred within a 48-hour time span from March 26 to March 28. Unidentified assailants targeted the major civilian rail line between Abuja and the northern city of Kaduna on March 28, just two days after a group of terrorists attacked Kaduna’s airport on March 26, killing one person and injuring several others. Another group of militants raided a Christian village in Niger state’s Munya region on March 27, subsequently abducting the local priest.

Nigeria has suffered from regular terror attacks for several years, most of which have been attributed to Boko Haram. The jihadist terror group known as Boko Haram established itself in northeastern Nigeria around 2009 and soon made international headlines for perpetrating mass abductions and massacres. The organization has grown stronger over the past two years, with reports suggesting Boko Haram has inched closer to Abuja, Nigeria’s centrally-located national capital, in recent months.

Reports from local Nigerian news outlets on April 4 suggested Nigeria’s terror spree last week continued unabated in the ensuing days.

“Twelve members of the Irigwe ethnic group were reportedly killed while 19 cattle belonging to Fulani herders were on Saturday night [April 2] shot dead in separate attacks in the villages of Bassa Local Government Area of [Nigeria’s] Plateau State,” the Daily Trust reported on Monday.

“Suspected armed bandits, Sunday night [April 3], invaded Tsafe town, the council headquarters of Tsafe Local Government Area of Zamfara State, killing many people,” the Premium Times reported on April 4.