Curfew in Bauchi, North East Nigeria Over Religious Clash afp20090727614002 Abuja Hot fm in English 26 Jul 09

He recalled that something like that had happened during the military era of President Ibrahim Babangida which was reversed by the late Sani Abacha regime.

The governor assured people in the state that his administration will not relent in the execution of projects despite the short-fall in the federal grants.

[Description of Source: Kano Daily Triumph Online in English -- Website of the Kano State government daily; URL: http://www.triumphnewspapers.com]

Nigeria: Report Says Fears of Religious Fundamentalists' Attack Still Lingers

AFP20091002619005 Lagos TheWeek in English 28 Sep 09 - 05 Oct 09 pp 16-20

[Report by Aliyu Askira: "The Road to Chaos"]

Few months after the Boko Haram uprising in some parts of the North, Islamic fundamentalist groups are once again raising the flag of a fresh war. Fears over their agenda and tactics grip the nation.

On Monday, September 21, Alhaji Lawal Abubakar, Kano State controller of prisons, woke up unusually early and with a strange feeling, in spite of the air of festivities around the Eid-el-Fitir public holiday. He had earlier placed several calls to his men who assured him that all was well but Abubakar was still not ready to take any chance.

The prison boss quickly organized a press briefing to raise an alarm about the plan by members of Boko Haram to attack Kano prisons and free their members detained there. The alarm, he added, was based on an intelligence report indicating that several members of Boko Haram group were regrouping in Gezawa local Government Area of Kano State with the aim of attacking prisons in the state.

The strategy worked for Abubakar as men of the civil defense corps and the police later moved in to secure the Kano main prison.

Abubakar's assertion however caused serious uproar in the city’s security circle. In an interview with THEWEEK, the Kano State police public relation officer, Baba Mohammed, said that the police was not aware of any threat by the Boko Haram sect.

"We are not aware of any security threat by the Boko Haram and if there is any useful information from any quarters we are ready to follow it up," he said, adding that the police in Kano was ready for any threat.

In a related development, the Kano State director of the State Security Service [SSS], Alhaji Bello Tukur Bakori also told newsmen that such security report as indicated by the prison boss did not emanate from the SSS.

Two days earlier, specifically on Friday, September 18, members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria, also known as the Shittes trooped out in their thousands in most parts of the North to commemorate the annual Quds day in solidarity with the people of Palestine in their struggle in the Middle East.

This had led to a bloody clash between them and the police in Zaria where three people died in the process, though the Kaduna State police commissioner, Mahammadu Tambari Yabo, confirmed the killing of only two people, insisting that the Shiites were the first to attack his men. In the long procession, the group carried placards and banners with anti-American and Israeli inscriptions.

Two months ago, the Boko Haram, an Islamic sect which is opposed to western values and education led by one Mohammed Yusuf, was engaged in a bloody battle with the Army in Maiduguri, capital of Borno State and other States in the North. Yusuf was later captured and summarily executed while over 1,000 members of the sect, including a former commissioner in the State were killed.

Less than two weeks after the Maiduguri uprising, the police, acting on a tip-off from the Niger State government, had invaded a village in the Mokwa area of the State to dislodge about 4,000 members of another Islamic sect, the Darullslam.

The police and the immigration service later screened the group and deported many of them to their countries of nationality. The police later arrested the leaders and charged them for forceful abduction, restriction of members' movement, wife swapping, to mention a few.

The leaders of the remnants of the Boko Haram sect were also arrested and detained in Bauchi, Kano and Maiduguri. The detention however has not lowered the antenna of fear in security circles. Shortly after the death of Yusuf, security operatives stumbled on a fresh intelligence report that members of the group were regrouping under new leaders in a state in the North-West.

The group, according to the report, had planed to wage another war soon in its bid to Islamize the country. It also threatened to attack some 'infidel' southern states. The new leader of the group, one Mallam Sani Umaru added that the group has "started jihad in Nigeria and that no force on earth can stop it."

In what looked like a confirmation of the threat, last week, the Christian Association of Nigeria [CAN] last week raised an alarm that the group had perfected plans to attack some cities in Cross River State. The association in its letter signed by its chairman, Bishop Archibong Archibong, to the state governor, alleged that the group, which had links with AI Shabab of Somalia and Alqaeda, had moved assorted weapons to an undisclosed location in Calabar, the State capital.

The group was said to have marked churches, prominent Christian and business leaders for attack. The association also sent some copies of the letter to the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, the State Chief Judge, the State Police Commissioner and the Zonal Assistant Inspector General of Police.

But the state government, according to the chief press secretary and the special assistant to the governor on media, Mr. Patrick Ugbe, had vowed to crush any attempt to breach the peace of the State.

Early this month, tension was high in Agege, in the Agege Local Government Area of Lagos State with a high population of Hausa and Muslims. Police and soldiers were immediately drafted to the area after a wide-spread rumor of an impending Boko Haram attack.

Unlike the Boko Haram movement, the Shiites that operate under the leadership of Sheik Ibraheem Zakzaky, a Zaria-based Islamic cleric, who is a graduate of Ahmadu Bello University Zaria is also different from the Darul Islam that were recently dislodged from Mokwa in Niger State.

But in spite of their differences, all their leaders, except Mallam Mohammed Yusuf of the Boro Haram, are graduates. The groups are allegedly sponsored by groups based in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Palestine, and Sudan.

After the clash in Zaria last week, Sheik Ibrahim ZakZaky allegedly went underground but his followers said that he was arrested and taken to Kaduna for questioning. In Kaduna, security sources told this Magazine that Zakzaky was taken to the SSS headquarters in Abuja.

Meanwhile, the aftermath of the clash in Zaria and the whereabouts of EI Zakyzaky are causing serious tension in Sokoto, Zaria, Kaduna, Maiduguri, Kano, Katsina, Gombe, Bauchi and several other states in the North.

To contain the rising tension, Islamic and political leaders in the north have been meeting to counter the plot of the fundamentalists. The leaders are also appealing to Muslims to shun religious extremism.

The Sultan of Sokoto and head of Amirul Mumini in Nigeria in his Ed-filtr sermon called on Islamic scholars to fear Allah in their conduct of Islamic propagation. He argued that Islamic scholars also need education because according to him, even Allah himself decreed that Muslims are free to go to any length of the universe to seek for knowledge and this, he said, include Western Education, which some scholars said is haram. "Boko is not haram," he added.

The Sultan maintained that most of our societal problems today was caused by poverty, disease and bad leadership and enjoined those in the position of authority to purge themselves of corrupt tendencies.

He lamented that the Boko Haram saga might repeat itself because the government has not really addressed the root of the crisis.

He noted that in spite of the death of the Boko Haram leader, his followers are still lurking around and they are likely to regroup and strike again. He added that the recent measures adopted at the Nigerian Inter Religious Council's deliberation were assuring and that the crisis would soon be a thing of the past.

Similarly the Emir of Kano, Alhaji Ado Bayero has also called for calm in the North. The Emir said that the activities of Boko Haram, Darul Islam and other fundamentalist groups are threats to the peaceful co-existence of the nation, adding that people should desist from engaging in the non-conformist ideas. He urged the government to deal decisively with the remnants of Darul lslam and Boko Haram.

Also, the secretary of the Arewa Consultative Forum [ACF], Mr. Anthony Sani told TheWeek that one of the causes of religious intolerance is electoral fraud and rigging. Islam and many religions he said, frowned at cheating and imposition of leaders on the electorate.

"So, what is happening in the country today is not surprising," he said.

Last week, the magazine got a snippet of the report of the General Abdullahi Sarki Muktar-Ied committee that investigated the Borno Boko Haram uprising. The report, which is ready to be presented to the president when he returns from Saudi Arabia where he went on an official visit, revealed that late Muhammed Yusuf and his group actually planned to topple the government of Yar'Adua.

A Security source insisted in Kaduna last week that this was partly why Yusuf was summarily killed to protect his backers. The report established that the plot was to spark off a nationwide uprising that would eventually topple the present government led by Umaru Yar'Adua.

The Mukhtar report also revealed that the attacks on police stations in Maiduguri, Gombe, Bauchi, Potiskum, and parts of Kano were actually a prelude to a general uprising meant to overthrow the federal government in order to establish an Islamic Republic, which is the ultimate goal of the group.

Meanwhile, Shehu Sani, president of the Civil Right Congress, in a statement in Kaduna last week, called on the international community to keep a tab on the issue so that a report will not be fabricated to justify the extra-judicial killing of Muhammed Yusuf leader of the Boko Haram and the members of his group.

"We are in a civilized society and we are signatory to the United Nations charter on human right. What happened to Yusuf and his group, to say the least, is barbaric, it was a clear case of extra-judicial killing and we in the civil right community condemn it in totality," he said.

Speaking to the press in Zaria last week, the spokesman of the Shiite leader, Dr. Abdullahi Danladi, debunked the claim that their leader, Sheik Ibrahim Yakubu El-Zakzaky had fled the country. Danladi alleged that the present predicament of the group stemmed from the attempt of the Kaduna State commissioner of police, Tambari Yaro, to bring down the group and its leaders at all cost on the allegation that the Shiites were stockpiling arms.

EI Zakyzaky had earlier denied this allegation himself. But the police commissioner Yabo, who also addressed the press, revealed that the group shot his men and in the process two of them were killed, while three were injured. Yabo vowed to retrieve all weapons in the possession of the sects because since they are piling arms, the probability that they were planning to strike was high.

Meanwhile, the leadership of the CAN gathered two weeks ago in Abuja to officially mourn the death of the pastors killed in the Maiduguri uprising. With the new threats of violence in the air, can the security forces prevent another round of mourning? Only time will tell.

[Description of Source: Lagos TheWeek in English - independent weekly news magazine]

Nigeria: Police Arrest 46 'Suspected' Islamic Sect Members in Lagos State

AFP20091004565005 Lagos Daily Independent Online in English 04 Oct 09

[Report by Joe Omokaro: "Police Arrest 46 Boko Haram Suspects in Lagos"]

Police in Lagos have arrested 46 persons suspected to be members of the violent religious sect, Boko Haram, which in July caused bloodbath in the Northern part of the country.

Sunday Independent gathered that the suspects were apprehended at Berger Area, an entry point to Lagos on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway.

Dependable police sources told this weekly on Friday that the suspects were being conveyed in a lorry when the police stopped the vehicle for a search and were stunned to see a large number of human beings instead of goods. Their number was said to have aroused suspicion, prompting the policemen to order the suspects out of the lorry for a thorough search and to explain their mission to Lagos.

It was also learnt that when their explanation could not convince the policemen, they were subsequently taken into custody and later transferred to the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) Panti, Yaba, for further investigation into their mission to Lagos.

Sunday Independent further learnt that they claimed to be Lagos residents who do menial jobs and were returning from Sallah holiday.

It was also gathered that majority of the suspects claimed to be natives of Kebbi State sharing borders with Niger Republic while few of them are said to be coming from Kwara State.

Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Marvel Akpoyibo, was said to have directed the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) in charge of Operations, Lateef Junaid, to liaise with the DCP in charge of SCID to investigate the matter. of the suspects "so that those who are not sect members should not be detained unjustly".

Akpoyibo, however, did not confirm or deny the arrest, but cautioned that issues that border on security should not be subjected to public knowledge, in order not to discourage foreign investors.

[Description of Source: Lagos Daily Independent Online in English -- Website of the privately owned independent daily; URL: http://www.independentngonline.com]

Nigeria: Group Condemns Government's Selective Approach to Social Deviants

AFP20091007606007 Abuja Leadership in English 07 Oct 09 p 1

The last may not have been heard of the Boko Haram episode as a group, Tawheed Initiative for Good Governance and Accountability [TIGA] has accused the federal government of sponsoring a mass killing of innocent young men, women, and children on the pretext of uprooting the troublesome sect. In a release entitled "Boko Haram: the culpability of Mr. President," and signed by its chairman, Dr. Adam Ahmad Abere, legal adviser, Barr. Sadau Garba, and publicity secretary, Mal. Aliyu Shehu Ibrahim, the group condemned what it described as the government's selective approach to social deviants in the country, saying that the Boko Haram mayhem could have been settled peacefully but for the order given by President Yar Adua to crush the sect.

The group, which also heaped blames on the Sultan of Sokoto, whom it said was contradictory in his comments on the mayhem and the subsequent killing of the sect's leader, traced the Boko Haram phenomenon to 1895 when the British invaded the Sokoto Caliphate. The Kaduna-based group said, "Since 25 July the world has been inundated with the so-called Boko Haram episode. Some people, especially the elite, felt and genuinely too that a group using Islam as a platform can successfully wage a war against western-designed education and could even go ahead and protectively arm itself against the Nigerian state.

"Between 25 July when the crisis broke out in Bauchi State and 6 August when the report of the government's killing of Sheik Muhammad Yusuf's in-law came in, more than 1,000 Muslims were killed by agents of the federal government in Bauchi, Kano, Yobe, and Borno states. Most of them were young men, women, and children. While at TIGA we do not support Sheik Muhammad Yusuf's style of rebelliousness against the state, we feel that as violently dramatic as the episode was it is typically inconclusive.

"Not only should Nigerians, especially Muslims, penetrate beyond government's claims and media reportage on the consideration, intent and philosophy of the group, they should be scientifically cursory about the corrosive and grossly over-killing method used by Umaru Musa Yar’Adua's government in solving the problem

"We are stupefied by the contradictory positions taken by His Eminence, the Sultan, JNI and Nigeria Inter-religious Council [NIREC]. In one breath, the Sultan commended the federal government and the security agencies for promptly containing the situation of the criminal activities of a devilish group called Boko Haram while in another he condemned the killing of the leader of the group in police custody in what appears as an extra-judicial killing."

The group, which also condemned government's double standard seen in its engaging the Niger Delta militants in dialogue and granting them amnesty but massacring the Boko Haram sect, called on the president to apologize to Nigerians for the massacre of youths and to the Muslim Ummah for deliberately decimating its population.

[Description of Source: Abuja Leadership in English - Privately owned daily]

Nigeria: Yar'Adua Orders 'Full Scale' Probe of Sacked Intelligence Agency Chief

AFP20091015590007 Lagos Vanguard Online in English 15 Oct 09

[Report by Daniel Idonor: "Yar'Adua Orders Probe of Sacked NIA Boss"]

Abuja -- President Umaru Yar'Adua has ordered a full scale investigation into the alleged role played by the sacked Director-General [DG] of the Nigerian Intelligence Agency, NIA, Mr Enaruna Emmanuel Imohe, in the issuance of a Federal Government circular currently making the round in Nigeria's missions abroad that no mission should entertain any inquiry from the duo of former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai and former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu.

Beside the sack of the NIA DG, President Yar'Adua through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has directed all Nigerian missions abroad to disregard the earlier directive mandating such missions not to render any consular assistance to the embattled duo.

Also, the President has directed Nigeria's former Ambassador to Benin Republic, Oladeji Olaniyi, who is the most senior in rank to the outgoing DG to assume duty as the acting Director-General of the NIA immediately.

A circular exclusively obtained by Vanguard, dated October 13, 2009 with file no. MSO. II/53, from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to all foreign missions, said "the Federal Government has directed that the content of Tel. s.111 dated September 17, 2009 should be reversed. Consequently, any request for re-issuance of passport or any consular assistance to the former FCT Minister [Federal Capital Territory], Mallam Nasir el-Rufai and former EFCC Chairman, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, should be entertained."

According to the circular signed by the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Bagudu Hirse, "for the avoidance of doubt, the said directive had no authority of Mr President who has ordered an investigation into the matter.

Furthermore, the Federal Government has reiterated that all Nigerian missions should give requisite consular assistance to any Nigerian, repeat, any Nigerian that requests for such assistance in any Nigerian mission abroad in line with the avowed commitment of the present administration to democracy and the rule of law".

It further stated that "Indeed, it is the inalienable right of every Nigerian to seek and be granted a Nigerian standard passport as enshrined in the Nigerian Constitution".

It also advised "all heads of mission should ensure immediate and strict compliance".

Imohe, was removed from his position, due to what industry watchers termed haphazard handling of a sensitive national matter.

According to our source in the Presidency, the removed NIA boss, who reportedly got approval from all necessary security authorities, including the office of the National Security Adviser to send a memo to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs instructing the nation's missions abroad not to provide consular services to the duo of el-Rufai and Ribadu was said to have allowed the said memo to leak.

"He should have couched such sensitive instructions in ciphers so that even if it falls into unsuspecting hands, they would not understand its contents," our source said.

It was also alleged that his sack may not be unconnected with the fact that the NIA did not provide the needed intelligence on the international connection of the Boko Haram sect, which instigated violence and bloodshed in some states in northern Nigeria recently.

Accordingly, Imohe who was appointed by former President Olusegun Obasanjo has been directed to hand over to the next in rank, Ambassador Olaniyi, who is currently on a 2-week course in the United States.

Ambassador Olaniyi is to head the NIA in an acting capacity, since he is also billed to retire from the service in January 2010.