Authorities in central Nigeria are struggling to cope with an influx of people fleeing their homes after a wave of ethnic killing following the murder 12 days ago of a traditional ruler.
The spark for the fighting was the June 12th killing of a traditional Hausa-speaking Azeri leader and five others, blamed on the minority ethnic Tiv.
But beneath that lies a mix of decades-old enmities between the Tiv and the Hausa-speakers worsened by growing competition for land in the area.
The government of Benue State, a majority Tiv state 180 miles southeast of the capital Abuja, has set up four camps to house tens of thousands of people fleeing the ethnic violence in neighbouring Nasarawa State.
One of the camps, at Daudu, 12 miles north of the Benue State capital Makurdi, has registered more than 17,000 people, mostly ethnic Tiv. A further 10,000 are being housed at two other camps.
"We are overwhelmed. We do not have the food to give to this number of people. We need assistance," said an official of the Benue State government.
"We are Tiv and we are doing what we can to help our brothers, but we need help as well," he said.
Mr Athanisious Kwambe, an 18-year-old schoolboy sheltering at the camp set up in a primary school in the village of Uikpam, is one of the victims.
"They killed my father. They shot him and cut his head off with a machete," he said, trembling. "I was there, hiding, seeing what they were doing... They entered our house, shot people and killed about five of us and burnt our place," he said.
The displaced in the camps have little to sleep under, lying on the bare grass or on boards and as of today no food had been supplied by the authorities.
Mr Moses Godo said he was exhausted and in need of food after trekking 44 miles to the camp through the bush. "I don't know where my parents are. My wife too, I don't know where she is, whether she has been killed... I am here along with one of my sisters," he said.
On the roads across Nasarawa State gangs of Hausa-speaking Azeri youths wearing black magic fetishes and carrying guns, knives and machetes were still mounting checkpoints and were searching cars and combing the area for Tiv.
Rival gangs of Tiv remained, setting up their own roadblocks to protect those Tiv who had remained.
AFP