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KonkNaija Media | May 5, 2016

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Boko Haram – ISWAP (Islamic State West African Province) Detonate Bomb in Maiduguri

Boko Haram – ISWAP (Islamic State West African Province) Detonate Bomb in Maiduguri

| On 13, Jul 2015

A bomb is believed to have exploded today in the outskirts of the town of Maiduguri, in northern Nigeria.

The blast occurred at Njimtilo, a village few kilometres to the gate of Maiduguri, where soldiers, customs and immigration officers, police and members of the Civilian-JTF mount one of  the biggest checkpoints in the city.

“The blast occurred at 12:30pm at the Njimtilo checkpoint; no one was reported dead but some Civilian-JTF members were injured,” said a plain clothes police officer, whose name cannot be mentioned as he was not officially cleared to speak. “It was not a suicide bomb from what I observed. I guess the bomb was either buried or dropped near the place.”

As at the time of filing this report, emergency aid workers, including NEMA had arrived the spot to evacuate the injured to the hospital.

Maiduguri is the capital of Borno state, the epicentre of terror group Boko Haram’s deadly insurgence.

It is not yet clear whether the explosion caused any fatal casualties. The incident occurred days after the government announced commercial flights would resume in Maiduguri, months after the local airport was closed over security concerns.

In June, Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari announced the military headquarters would be relocated from Abuja to Maiduguri until the fight against terrorism was over.

The Nigerian government is currently aided by mercenaries and troops from neighbouring countries Chad, Benin, Niger and Cameroon in its offensive and has scored some successes since the military cooperation started in February.

The US announced it would send military trainers to help the Nigerian army improve its intelligence gathering and logistic.

Who are Nigeria’s Boko Haram terrorists?

Boko Haram (recently renamed Iswap) has held Nigeria to ransom with indiscriminate killing for almost a decade.

The acronym ISWAP stands for Islamic State’s West African Province (Iswap), the name given to Boko Haram weeks after the insurgents pledged allegiance to the Islamic State (Isis) terror group.

Boko Haram – a nickname given by Nigerians which translates from the Hausa language as “western education is forbidden” – has caused thousands of deaths since its insurgence in north-eastern Nigeria started in 2009.
The group’s official name was Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad, which means “People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet’s Teachings and Jihad”.

Three states − Adamawa, Borno and Yobe − have been under a state of emergency since May 2013, due to Boko Haram’s attacks.

The group has killed more than 2,900 people since the beginning of 2015.

Earlier in July, a suspected Boko Haram twin bomb attack on a mosque and a restaurant in the provincial Nigerian capital of Jos killed at least 44 people and injured 67.

 

IB Times