A live-streamed worship service at the Christ Apostolic Church (CAC), Oke Isegun, in Eruku, Ekiti Local Government Area of Kwara State, was disrupted when terrorists launched a sudden attack, reportedly killing at least three people and abducting several worshippers.
The terrorists also injured a local vigilante. The attack, according to sources in Egbe, a Kogi State garrison town bordering Eruku in Kwara State, occurred on Tuesday evening.
PREMIUM TIMES spoke to three sources familiar with the incident, whose names have been withheld for security reasons.
“So far, three people have been reported dead,” one of the sources, a farmer in the town, said.
Another source estimated the fatalities at five, noting many people were missing.
The live-streamed video
One of the worshippers, Dare Daniel, was live-streaming the worship session on Facebook when the assailants stormed the church, shooting.
Mr Daniel’s account, which usually live-streams his church services, has now disappeared from the microblog, with sources speculating that the terrorists deleted it.
One source suspected that the terrorists, locally known as bandits, might have been following Mr Daniel’s account for a long time.
“He has been live-streaming services from inside the church,” the source said. “The bandits might have been monitoring his livestreams before striking on Tuesday evening.”
The live-streamed video, now viral, shows a group of worshippers, including children and elderly women, singing and dancing.
The service was abruptly terminated when the terrorists marched in. While the young and agile worshippers scampered for safety, the elderly women struggled to escape.
The video shows the four terrorists operating inside the church for about five minutes, shooting and looting handbags.
Mr Daniel was believed to have placed his phone somewhere to record the service. The phone later rang, prompting one of the terrorists to grab it and end the live-streaming. The video captured the terrorist’s face.
The status of Mr Daniel—whether kidnapped or killed—remains unclear as of the time of this reporting.
Police confirm attack
PREMIUM TIMES earlier reported that the Kwara State Police Command confirmed the attack.
The police spokesperson in the North-central state, Toun Ejire-Adeyemi, said the attack happened around 6 p.m. on Tuesday.
She said two people were killed, an account that negated the estimation given by the sources we spoke with.
However, Mrs Ejire-Adeyemi corroborated our sources, saying a Segun Ajala, a vigilante, sustained gunshot injuries and had been “rushed to ECWA Hospital, Eruku, for medical treatment.”
She identified those killed during the attack as Tunde Ajayi and another man simply identified as Mr Aderemi. The latter, according to the police, was found “fatally shot” inside the church, while the former’s body was discovered in the bush.
‘Terrorists returned hours later’
“The terrorists returned to the town around 11:20 p.m.,” another source who was briefed by a stranded traveller on the Ilorin-Egbe-Kabba road, said.
He said the traveller, his younger brother, was heading back to Egbe from Ilorin when the first attack on the church occurred.
“He had been stranded alongside other travellers on the road. They slept there,” he said. “He sent me a message exactly at 11:20 pm when the terrorists returned.”
Our sources expressed anger, questioning how, with the presence of a divisional police division in Eruku and a military base near the town, the assailants operated “unchallenged.”
The military base is located in Egbe, approximately three kilometres from Eruku, where the incident occurred.
At press time, the Nigerian Army spokesperson, Lieutenant Colonel Appolonia Anele, had not responded to an enquiry sent to her.
Ongoing debates over ‘Christian genocide’
The church attack happened amid debates over alleged Christian genocide in Nigeria.
One of the sources who spoke with our reporter on Wednesday morning accused the Nigerian government of attempting to conceal the “truth.”
Similar attacks were carried out in Okene, Kogi and Owo, Ondo State. The prime suspects of the Owo church attack, which took place in 2022, have been arrested and are now facing trial. The mastermind of the 2012 Okene church killing, an ex-inmate, has been re-arrested three years after his comrades freed him from Kuje prison.
U.S. President Donald Trump had threatened to “do things to Nigeria that Nigeria is not going to be happy about” and “go into that now-disgraced country guns-a-blazing.”
He promised swift military action against Nigeria if the government fails to stop terror groups from targeting Christians.
Mr Trump’s threat came a few hours after Washington redesignated Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern” for allegedly violating religious freedoms.
The redesignation came months after vested interests repeatedly alleged that Islamist militants were targeting Christians in Nigeria.
These interests, including politicians, alleged that the Boko Haram group has killed over 100,000 Christians since 2009 and burnt 18,000 churches.
The Nigerian government rejected the claim, describing it as a “gross misrepresentation of reality”.
The presidency argued that “terrorists attack all who reject their murderous ideology—Muslims, Christians and those of no faith alike.”
