Boko Haram: Slain Pastor To Be Buried In Mubi, Wife And Children Still Missing.

The wife and three children of a pastor killed by Boko Haram in the last Monday attack at a Borno community may have been abducted by the insurgents as members of the church headed by the slain pastor said they are yet to see the family.

Suspected Boko Haram members attacked Dille near Lassa in Askira/Uba Local Government,  south of Borno, killing no fewer than 25 people including the pastor of the local assembly of The Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) in the town, Taiwo Dokun.

According to Vanguard , a member of the church, Jacob Mamza, spoke to journalists yesterday on phone from Dille, about 200 kilometres from Maiduguri, Borno State capital and recounted how the Ondo State-born Pastor Taiwo was murdered by the rampaging insurgents.

According to him, the clergy was shot and butchered while attempting to flee his house on the fateful morning of the attack, having realised the attackers were closing in on him in his official quarters. “The pastor was in his house at about 6am when the insurgents attacked the village, his house was surrounded by the hoodlums and while attempting to run, he was shot.

 He was running to a neighbour’s house and it was in the course of his fleeing that he was shot in the head and the chest and the insurgents equally came to butcher him to make sure that he was dead,” Mamza disclosed in a emotion-laden voice. 

He said the terrorists then went into the pastor’s house and burnt it, adding that Boko Haram fighters may have abducted the pastor’s wife and three children “who are apparently inside the house” at the time of the attack.

 “The family could have been abducted by the insurgents who took away many of the residents of the town because we didn’t see the family members since then and none of them has called us. Though their residence was completely razed by the insurgents, we didn’t also find their corpses in the debris. This is our dilemma now,” another church member, who preferred anonymity, told journalists.

The source said members of the church at Dille who were already scattered, may be compelled to bury the slain pastor at Mubi in Adamawa State where the corpse is presently deposited. The source said the decision was informed by the decomposing condition of the corpse and financial implication of conveying it to Akure, Ondo State where the deceased hailed from.

 “He might be buried at Mubi for he was initially taken to a Mubi hospital where he was embalmed but because it was not properly done, the corpse started swelling up and a decision was taken to bury him in the town.”