Armed herdsmen were reported to have killed a patent medicine seller, identified as Ojoma Emie, in Ikobi, Apa Local Government Area of Benue State.
According to a local source, the alleged killers of the patent medicine merchant severed and removed his head.
According to a local source, who only goes by the name Sam, the incident occurred Monday.
Sam told our correspondent in a phone chat on Monday that the deceased had gone to the local government headquarters in Ugbokpo and was returning to his base in Ikobi when he was attacked.
“What we gathered was that the deceased, who was a patent medicine seller, had gone to Ugbokpo to buy medicine and stock his shop.
“Unfortunately, as he was returning to his community at Ikobi, he was ambushed on a motorcycle at Ugbobi Junction, killed, and the assailants cut off his head and went away with it,” Sam said.
He went on to say that the location of the occurrence has a history of ambushes against travelers.
Confirming the occurrence, the local government chairman, Adams Ochega, stated that the victim was on his way to Ikobi when he was ambushed, slain, and beheaded.
Ochega said, “He was on his way from Ikobi to Ugbokpo when the killers ambushed him and beheaded him on the way.”
Meanwhile, the spokesperson for the State Command, DSP Udeme Edet, said she had yet to receive the report.
Apa LGA is one of the councils in Benue State that has continued to see killings of innocent people by alleged armed herders.
At least four persons returning from a burial were massacred in April by suspected armed herdsmen at Ankpali village in the Edikwu region of the same LGA.
