At least 29 people have been killed and a church burned to the ground after Islamic State West Africa Province militants swept into the quiet farming community of Guyaku in Gombi Local Government Area, Adamawa State, late Saturday and turned a local football pitch into a slaughter ground.
The assault, which the Islamic State formally claimed via its Amaq news agency late Sunday, is one of the deadliest single attacks on Adamawa State in recent months and has left the community reeling in grief and terror.
Witness accounts pieced together by Prime Brief Media and corroborated by local officials describe a scene of sudden and indiscriminate violence. At around 6 p.m. on Saturday, April 26, 2026, scores of young people had gathered at the village football field for a routine weekend match. Such gatherings are a cornerstone of social life in Guyaku and countless other rural communities across Nigeria’s northeast.
Without warning, armed men surrounded the pitch and began shooting. There was no ultimatum, no opportunity to flee. Residents reported hearing sustained, heavy gunfire that lasted for close to half an hour. By the time the attackers withdrew, 29 people lay dead, many of them teenagers and young men who had only moments earlier been competing or cheering on the sidelines.
The killers did not stop with the football pitch. They moved through the village, setting fire to a church, several homes, and dozens of motorcycles. For Guyaku’s Christian minority, the burning of a place of worship is a stark and terrifying echo of a pattern that has played out across Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe states over more than a decade of conflict.
Governor Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri visited the devastated community on Monday, walking among the burnt-out shells of homes and comforting grieving families. In brief remarks, he described the attack as “cowardice” and said such acts would not break the spirit of the people of Adamawa.
“What I have seen here is deeply tragic. Innocent young people, full of life and hope, cut down in the most brutal fashion. The government will not stand idle. We are intensifying security operations and working with federal forces to ensure that those responsible are hunted down and made to face justice,” the governor said.
The governor also announced immediate humanitarian relief for displaced families and directed the State Emergency Management Agency to conduct a rapid needs assessment in Guyaku and surrounding villages.
A community elder in Guyaku who spoke to Prime Brief Media on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals painted a vivid picture of a village in trauma. “We buried 29 people yesterday. Some families lost three or four members. The whole village is empty now; everyone has fled to the bush or to relatives in Gombi town. We have never seen such a thing here,” he said.
The attack on Guyaku follows a clear pattern of ISWAP operations in recent months: striking soft civilian targets, particularly those associated with Christian communities and gatherings, often with a symbolic resonance—churches during services, and now a football pitch full of young people. The Islamic State, in its claim of responsibility, described the attack as targeting “Christians and their gatherings,” repeating the genocidal language that has become increasingly central to the group’s propaganda.
The location of the attack is also significant. Gombi Local Government Area sits on the fringes of the Sambisa Forest corridor, a historic stronghold for both Boko Haram and ISWAP. While the Nigerian military has significantly degraded the groups' capacity to hold large swathes of territory, they retain the ability to launch lethal, small-unit raids on isolated rural communities, often under cover of night or timed to catch security forces off guard.
The burning of a church in Guyaku mirrors earlier ISWAP tactics seen in Hong Local Government Area in late December 2025, when multiple Christian villages were attacked and a statement was released threatening all Christians in Nigeria with death, conversion, or the payment of a religious tax, the jizya.
The latest violence adds to an already deepening security crisis in Adamawa State. Just days earlier, suspected Fulani militia attacks were reported in other parts of the state, while banditry and farmer-herder violence continue to erode rural stability. Aid agencies warn that the cumulative effect of these attacks is pushing already vulnerable populations into deeper food insecurity and displacement, with humanitarian access often restricted by insecurity.
Prime Brief Media continues to monitor the situation in Gombi and the broader northeast region. We will provide updates as more information becomes available on the investigation, the status of the missing, and any further arrests or military operations linked to this attack.
