Terrorist in Gwoza the Kidnapper of Saint Mary’s Pupils?
By Luka Binniyat and Mike Odeh James
(Abuja) – Boko Haram terrorists overran a poorly defended army base in Gwoza Wednesday night, killing 200, including 50 soldiers and abducting at least 300 civilians in Ngoshe town, survivors told TruthNigeria.
Ngoshe, a town of 6,000, chiefly Christians, is surrounded by smaller settlements in Gwoza county (Local Government Area), Borno state Northeast. Islamic terrorists have been waging an insurgency to establish a caliphate centered on Gwoza since 2009.
Ngoshe and its surroundings were deserted from 2014, when Boko Haram (Western learning forbidden) seized the town, forcing 80,000 people to flee to nearby Cameroon Republic as refugees.
About 3,000 of those who fled were returned last year to Ngoshe, just to face Wednesday’s attacks, TruthNigeria has learned.
TruthNigeria has received an unverified short video showing decapitated heads on sand with a background voice describing them as “lifeless heads of infidels.”
A Killing Field of Christian Bodies
A native of Ngoshe said that he has lost several relations in the attack saying that the casualty figure could be more than 200 deaths.
“It is very unfortunate that the media has forgotten us. How can such slaughter of Nigerian go unreported in the media?” according to Sulieman Ayuba, speaking to TruthNigeria Friday, March 6, 2026,
“They attacked the military base in Ngoshe and burned down all the vehicles of the military, seized their arms and killed many of them,” he said.
“They killed about 50 soldiers and dumped their bodies in a room,” Ayuba said.
“They then descended on Ngoshe and surrounding villages of Agapalawa, Aganjara, Amuda and Bokko and started killing people while abducting women and children,” he said.
“They burned down every church in these communities, as well as schools, a police station and everything that stands for modern use,” Ayuba said.
“From information reaching me, at least 200 were killed,” he said. “Hundreds of women and children were also abducted by the terrorists,” he added.
“Some survivors escaped to the mountains around Ngoshe. This afternoon, I am told that the terrorists have climbed the hill and were setting it on fire to smoke out those hiding there,” he said.
According to him the Islamists have beheaded scores of Christians in the attack that lasted several hours.
“As I speak with you now, Ngoshe is under the occupation of Boko Haram. Not a single Nigerian troop is there,” Ayuba told TruthNigeria.
Borno Authorities Slow to Give Facts
Scrambling to respond to a base overrun in Ngoshe, the Nigeria army has yet to give a statement to the press after two days. However, Vanguard has reported that the Senator representing Borno South Senatorial Constituency, Sen. Ali Ndume, has confirmed the attack. Yet the casualty figures he gave are dramatically under the true number, according to sources who spoke to TruthNigeria.
“Senator Ali Ndume, representing Borno South, confirmed that the Chief Imam of Ngoshe and several elders were among those slaughtered in Wednesday attacks.
According to the Vanguard report, security sources told him that at least seven soldiers and 11 civilians were killed, with over 100 persons still missing,” the paper quoted Ndume as saying
“Troops on the frontline lack Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles while terrorists deploy drones and rocket-propelled grenades. The military base at Ngoshe was dislodged and overrun, with equipment destroyed,” Ndume said.
The Secretary to the District Head of Ngoshe Community, Shuaibu Dabawa, told News Central Television Thursday that more than 300 residents were abducted when the terrorists attacked the community around 6:20 pm March 5, forcing residents to flee into nearby bushes for safety.
Ransom Money Funding Fresh Attacks?
“The leader of Boko Haram that led the attack is called Ali Ngulde,” according to Ayuba. “He is the one that AFP media said that government paid him N2 billion Naira in Gwoza for the release of those schoolgirls kidnapped from a Catholic school in Niger state last year,” Ayuba told TruthNigeria.
“We believe the story and we believe that it was that money that Boko Haram is using to empower their genocide against us,” he said.
Nigeria government has denied paying such a ransom to Boko Haram, as reported by Arise TV and other media.
Ayuba shared a trending video of Boko Haram terrorist kingpin Ali Ngulde purportedly shot in Ngoshe town. Ngulde is wearing military camouflage flanked by fellow terrorists, boasting about the Ngoshe massacre.
“Nigeria military has been bragging that we are nothing; that we cannot do anything,” he said in Hausa language.
“But look, today, Allah has brought us into Goshe town. We have come here to stay,” he said.
“By the grace of Allah, we shall carry out the Muslim end-of-fasting Sallah celebration here.
“We have beheaded the men. We have killed the soldiers.
“We have enslaved their wives and children. Allah has ordered us to enslave them,” he said.
“Islam has come to stay in Ngoshe,” he said in the one-minute video.
The Fatal Repatriation
The attack video aimed to discredit the ability of authorities to defend citizens from murder. Most victims were refugees recently returned from Cameroon’s Minawao camp under a high-profile repatriation drive.
Borno State Governor Babagana Zulum personally had visited Minawao in December 2025, pledging safe return for over 12,000 Nigerians and offering 500,000 naira (approximately $320) per family to encourage repatriation, according to Humangle report of December last year.
For refugees who had spent more than a decade in limbo, the offer seemed like salvation.
Human rights lawyer Emmanuel Ogebe had warned U.S. officials months earlier that inducing refugees back to Gwoza—where Boko Haram declared its caliphate in 2014—was “a setup for disaster.”
Speaking from Washington after the attack, Ogebe told TruthNigeria, “The Borno government is paying refugees to come home and be killed. They’re going because the international community left them vulnerable.”
TruthNigeria calls to Commissioner of Information and Home Security, Prof. Usman A. Tar were not returned.
Luka Binniyat and Mike Odeh James write for TruthNigeria on conflict and politics from Kaduna.
