Gunmen from a suspected criminal gang attacked a village market in northwest Nigeria’s Sokoto state, killing 43 people, the state government said Monday.

Heavily armed gangs known locally as bandits have terrorised northwest and central Nigeria for years, raiding and looting villages, but attacks have become even more violent in recent months.

“Forty-three people have been confirmed dead following the attack by bandits in Goronyo village” on Sunday, Sokoto government spokesman Muhammad Bello said in a statement.

“It was a market day and there were many traders,” Bello told AFP by phone.

Police spokesman Sanusi Abubakar also confirmed that bandits attacked Goronyo late on Sunday.

“Our security operatives are there to conduct investigations,” Abubakar added, without giving details.

Phone networks in the area have been suspended for weeks to disrupt the gangs’ operations, making information-gathering difficult.

A gang raided another village market on October 8, in Sabon Birni district near the border with Niger, killing 19 people.

Since last month, Nigerian troops have been conducting air and ground operations against bandit camps in neighbouring Zamfara state.

Telecom services were also shut down in Zamfara, and parts of Kaduna and Katsina states.

– Governor seeking reinforcements –

Officials in Sokoto are worried that bandits are relocating to the state as a result of operations in Zamfara.

“We’re faced and bedevilled by many security challenges in our own area here, particularly banditry, kidnapping and other associated crimes,” wrote Bello, on behalf of the state governor.

Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal had requested “the presence of more forces in the state and the deployment of more resources”, he added.

Last month 17 Nigerian security personnel were killed when gunmen attacked their base in Sabon Birni, an assault the military blamed on Islamic State-aligned jihadists.

Although the bandits have no known ideological agenda, concerns have grown of jihadist inroads in the region.

Violence has spiralled in recent months across the northwest, forcing thousands of already vulnerable people to flee their homes, a situation aid agencies fear risks becoming a humanitarian crisis.

Since January 2020, about 50,000 people fled from their homes in the northwest alone, according to the International Organization for Migration.

More than 80,000 additional people have fled to neighbouring Niger over the past two years.

Increasingly, bandits have turned to mass kidnapping and have taken hundreds of schoolchildren since December. Most have been freed or released after ransom but dozens are still being held.

The violence is just one challenge facing Nigeria’s security forces. They are also battling a 12-year jihadist insurgency in the northeast that has killed more than 40,000 people.