Benue state Governor, Samuel Ortom has lost three of his relatives in an attack by suspected Fulani herdsmen.
The three, two males and a female, were killed Saturday evening when the gunmen laid an ambush and blocked the Lordye- Gbajimba road in Guma Local Government Area of the state.
The victims were riding on a motorcycle when they were ambushed and shot dead by the herdsmen who are said to have taken over parts of the local government bordering Nasarawa State.
Security agencies, who recovered the bodies, said those who were shot died on the spot from gunshot wounds while the other was brutally macheted to death.
Soldiers attached to Operation Whirl Stroke recovered the bodies and deposited the corpses at Gbajimba general hospital.
A statement by the Chief Press Secretary to Governor Ortom, Nat Ikyur, Saturday night, said, “this has been the plight of Benue indigenes in the hands of Fulani herdsmen who have invaded the state in a bid to take over our ancestral lands”.