Bandits shut down Kaduna Airport, kill NAMA security personnel

Bandits numbering over 200 with sophisticated weapons, on Saturday afternoon, took over the runway of the Kaduna International Airport, killing a security personnel of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA).

The attack was said to have forced the Authority to temporarily shut down activities at the Airport, while the military battle the gunmen.

The bandits had prevented a Lagos-bound flight from taking off around 12:30pm.

According to a credible source, “the bandits attack started around 12:00am today (Saturday). They started attacking the Airport around the midnight. The bandits were alleging that the military personnel took away their cattle.

“The military were able to repel them that midnight and we thought that was all. In fact, our staff resumed work this morning as usual. They worked around the runway five till around 12:00pm.

“Then, shortly after that, some NAMA staff went to check some of their equipment, then these people (bandits) appeared and started shooting. The NAMA engineers scampered for safety, they could not even go and entered the vehicle that took them to the site. It was in the process that their security man was shot in the head.

“The security man was rushed to the hospital and he was confirmed dead.

“As I am talking to you now, the military are still battling those guys, and they are proving difficult to be repelled. Now, they had shutdown the Airport,” the source said.

It was, however, gathered that many of the staff have already fled the Airport, while more military personnel have been deployed to the scene on clearance operation with a Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC).

However, as at the time of filing this report, the Kaduna State Police Command’s Public Relations Officer, ASP Muhammad Jalige, promised to get across to the DPO in charge of the area and get back to our correspondent but didn’t do so at press time.
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