Gunmen have burnt a commercial vehicle conveying 42 passengers in Sokoto, according to reports.
The passengers were fleeing Sabon Birni Local Government Area of the state due to the activities of gunmen.
Some witnesses told the BBC that the incident happened around 9am on Monday.
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“The vehicle conveying the passengers was coming from Sabon Birni, it had covered no more than six kilometers to Gidan Bawa village when the tragedy happened,” according to some people who took part in the rescue efforts.
The funeral prayers for the deceased had since taken place.
The Sokoto State Police Command was not immediately available for comment as the spokeperson’s phone number was switched off while the state commissioner for security did not answer calls to his mobile phone number.
A witness told the BBC: “When the incident happened, I was in Sabon Birni. Among the travellers were my maternal uncle, his wife and four children.
“Two of the children died. When we reached the scene, many have died. We have counted no fewer than 25 corpses,” he said, adding that few persons survived, some of them in critical condition.
“You wouldn’t even see a complete corpse. We had to be joining different limbs to enable us observe the funeral prayer.”
He added that he was inside the car park when thw vehicle left. “Members of park union were the ones who told us the number of passengers,” he said.
