Makwachi Okafo

Also in this podcast. The former child refugees walking the length of Britain to highlight the war in South Sudan.

I spoke with a lawmaker from the community, that's the Woro community, and he did say that gunmen attacked the village, killed some people and raided some shops and set it ablaze. So it seems like they are now seeing more and more numbers of deaths. I have seen that the AFP news agency said that the Red Cross has seen over 100 deaths.

So the numbers are increasing. We don't know specifically what group has carried out this attack, as no group has come out to say it's them that did it. But it kind of shows the trend of violence we're beginning to see across many parts of Nigeria. Kwarazit is in north central, which isn't historically one of the parts of the country where you will see violence like this. But in recent weeks and months, we're beginning to see such attacks across central Nigeria.

And what has been the reason for some of these attacks in other parts of central Nigeria? It's been difficult to say, but most of the attacks in the area have been a mix of many issues. You see banditry, what we locally call banditry, where armed men attack villages, abduct people for ransom, loot villages and loot shops, loot marketplaces and carry out people's belongings. Sometimes it can be economical.

But we've also seen some cases where they are ideological, where jihadists also carry out attacks like this in central Nigeria, not just in Kaira state, but in neighboring Niger states, which has also seen abductions in schools. And even Kaira state at the end of last year saw an abduction in a church where worshippers were having an evening worship and people were abducted and even some people died in that attack. And what is the government saying and what is the government doing to try and prevent these attacks?

The government has said it is ramping up efforts to clamp down on insurgency. We have seen even stronger collaborations with countries like the US. Yesterday the Nigerian government did confirm that a team of US soldiers are now in the country to help assist the country both with intelligence sharing and training.

Makwachi Okafo.