February 02, (THEWILL) — Seven months after the gruesome murder of over 200 persons and the displacement of 3,000 residents in one of the bloodiest attacks by gunmen in Yelwata, a community in Benue State, for two days, June 13 and 14, 2025, the confirmed suspects will be arraigned in court today, Monday, February 2, 2026.
The Federal Government disclosed this development on Sunday. According to Kamarudeen Ogundele, the Special Assistant to the President on Communication and Publicity in the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, the arraignment of the suspects comes after a painstaking investigation and collaboration by government agencies.
“Some suspects arrested and strongly linked to the killings in Yelwata, a town in Benue State, will be arraigned tomorrow (Monday, February 2) to answer for their crimes. They will be arraigned before Justice Joyce Abdul-Malik of the Federal High Court, Abuja, ” he said.
Arguing that the Bola Tinubu Administration is committed to the protection of the lives and property of every Nigerian, as enshrined in the Constitution, Ogundele stated that the arraignment will send a clear message to those who perpetrate violence under any guise.
THEWILL recalls that the killings in Yelwata community, located in the Guma Local Government Area of Benue State, was reportedly carried out by 40 gunmen who stormed the village on motorcycles in pairs, shouting “Allahu Akbar” as they opened fire on residents, moving from house to house and setting houses on fire.
The killings, alleged to be carried out by herdsmen, began in the night on Saturday, June 13, 2025 and continued into the early hours of Sunday, June 14. Apart from setting houses ablaze and gunning down residents who tried to escape, the killers mutilated their victims, attacked a market and a Catholic Mission, as well as engaged security forces in a shootout.
Hope Faith Ori, a data officer with the Catholic Diocese of Makurdi’s Justice, Peace and Development Foundation (JPDF), had confirmed that at least 150 bodies were counted, with 70 already sent to the morgue. Many corpses remain scattered across farmlands; some burned beyond recognition.
Rev. Fr. Remigius Ihyula, Director of JPDF, had warned that the humanitarian crisis in Yelwata was worsened by contaminated water of the community, lack of food supplies and the fact that survivors were too frightened to leave their homes.
The horrific scale of the massacre drew a reaction from a Catholic religious freedom advocate in Washington, Jacqueline Halbig von Schleppenbach.
“All accounts of those on the ground note that this is the bloodiest massacre on record. The time is now for the Trump administration to name Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) and for the US Congress to pass H.R. 220 in support of the State Department’s CPC previous designation,” von Schleppenbach, Principal Consultant Sovereign Global Solutions, LLC, a public affairs firm focusing on international religious freedom and human rights, said in a text to Truth Nigeria.
The Yelwata killings sparked national and global outrage, prompting President Tinubu to visit Benue on June 20, 2025. During his stop at Yelwata, the President directed Service Chiefs and the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, to identify and arrest those responsible for the massacre.
A few days after the President’s directive, IGP Kayode Egbetokun announced the arrest of 26 suspected masterminds of the Yelwata killings.
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