Nigeria: Report Gives Details, Says Terrorist Groups Gaining Foothold in Nigeria

[Report by Uju Amuta: "More People Indicate Interest to Join Boko Haram"]

Just within 24 hours of soliciting for membership, scores of new converts from diverse tribes and religions all over the country have signified their intention to join the dreaded Boko Haram Islamic sect. The group has claimed responsibility for series of killings and bomb attacks in some northern states, especially Maiduguri, the Borno State capital. This is coming even as residents of Maiduguri and members of the Joint Task Force [JTF] have disagreed over those responsible for the recent killings in the area. Boko Haram has through its website initiated moves to recruit more people to join its fold to boost its followership and about 38 interested Nigerians have signified their interest to join the sect. Out of the 38 people who have volunteered to join the sect, three are Yoruba, going by their names.

Two of them only gave their first names as Gbenga, Adewole and Precious Bankole. Four other volunteers are of Igbo extraction and they submitted names as Emmanuel Nwanganga, Israel, Jason Wallace and Christian Abugu. Other names like Salihu Salihu, Yusuf Ahmed, Osama Adamu and other northern names also featured on the list.

The sect, in its posting on its website, www.yusufislamicbrothers. blogspot. com has called on true faithful to join its fold. It said: "We call on all true faithful who believe in our cause to join us by enlisting as followers and become a member of the brotherhood on our site." The group also claimed that it represented the wishes and aspirations of the people. The sect added: "We do not live in camps and we are well known by the people. We are supported by the local people just as they know us well. The locals love us and they will never betray us because they believe in our cause.

As for the State Security Services [SSS], we are not far away from you, if you get us, come for us, we will not relent until we achieve our aim."

Meanwhile, residents of Maiduguri hit by bomb blast on Sunday said soldiers went on a rampage after the attack, shooting indiscriminately and torching homes and shops, resulting in a number of deaths. A resident, who simply identified himself as Marwa Ibrahim, said he saw eight dead bodies after the explosion near the palace of the Shehu of Borno. At the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, a morgue attendant, said five dead bodies were deposited at the hospital’s morgue. Details of Sunday’s attack could also not be confirmed last night. But spokesman of the JTF, Lt. Col. Hassan Mohammed, refused to confirm that there were deaths in the Sunday’s explosion.

He, however, said that three soldiers were injured after bombs were thrown at a patrol team. He also did not give details. Residents said series of bomb blasts occurred in the Budum area of the city followed by sporadic gunshots. Mohammed confirmed the explosion and the injury to the three soldiers, but he did not give the extent of the injuries. Military officials on Saturday said suspected Boko Haram members bombed its patrol team in Budum, injuring three soldiers.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International yesterday advised security forces to stop unlawful killings "after at least 23 people were killed by police following a bomb blast on Saturday in the northeastern city of Maiduguri." "President Goodluck Jonathan must get a grip on the Nigerian armed forces and immediately prevent them from carrying out further human rights violations and unlawful killings," said Tawanda Hondora, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Africa. "The government must now investigate these heinous crimes and put on trial those found to be responsible for the killings. Allowing troops to go on the rampage will not bring to justice those who carry out these terrible bomb attacks on civilians," he said. "While staying within the law, the government must step up efforts to bring to justice members of Boko Haram who wreck untold suffering on people."

One wing of Boko Haram has reportedly disowned the bomb blast, saying it may have been carried out by a splinter group. One human rights defender told Amnesty International: "Soldiers went on the rampage. They shot several people and burned all their shops and properties and burned their cars."

Following a bombing in Maiduguri two weeks ago, members of the JTF reportedly threatened to shoot residents if they failed to report planned attacks. "House to house searches, brutalization, unlawful arrests, killings and disappearances have been the operating practice in Maiduguri for some months now. Unless steps are taken to ensure security forces operate within the law and respect human rights at all times, the next time Boko Haram attacks or kills a soldier, we are likely to see the same thing happen again," said Hondora.

Thousands of people living in Maiduguri have already left the city; and many more continue to do so. The JTF has also been accused of raping women during their operations in recent months. "Allegations of rape of women by members of the JTF have to be investigated and perpetrators brought to justice," Hondora said. "Survivors of rape and sexual violence must be provided with appropriate support and aftercare," he added. Since July 2010, attacks by people believed to be members of Boko Haram have increased. More than 250 people have been killed in such attacks, many of which have targeted police officers and government officials. Several religious leaders have been killed and churches have also been targeted. Since June 2011, Boko Haram has also attacked bars and beer-gardens, killing scores of people.

[Description of Source: Port Harcourt The Tide in English -- Daily owned by the Rivers State Newspaper Corporation]

Nigeria: Suspected Islamic Sect Gunmen Kill District Head in Borno State

AFP20110727581002 New York Sahara Reporters in English 1257 GMT 26 Jul 11

[Unattributed report: "Boko Haram Kills District Head and his 9-Year Old Daughter in Maiduguri"]

Suspected Boko Haram islamists shot and killed Mohammed Ali Lawal, the district head of Bulabulin in Maiduguri around 8: am today in Maiduguri.

Alhaji Ali's attackers numbering 3 also shot and killed his 9 years old daughter. A neighbor's daughter was also caught in the cross fire. Family sources claimed she sustained serious injuries.

Since its resurgence about a year ago, the northeasatern Nigeria based islamist sect has targetted and killed several districts heads, islamic scholars, local officials and security agents in a campaign of violence.

[Description of Source: New York Sahara Reporters in English -- Nigerian Diaspora human rights-oriented news website; URL: http://www.saharareporters.com]

Nigeria: Government To Provide Toll-Free Lines To Tackle Islamic Sect Crisis

AFP20110727581007 Lagos This Day Online in English 27 Jul 11

[Report by Senator Iroegbu: "FG To Provide Toll-free Lines To Tackle Boko Haram"]

Determined to arrest the surging menace of Boko Haram, the Federal Government has said plans are afoot to make telecommunications operators dedicate emergency toll-free lines to the public to fast-track its intelligence gathering option on the sect.

Speaking at a two-day national stakeholders' summit on security and public awareness, held in Abuja Tuesday, President Goodluck Jonathan also said his administration would ensure that the telephone service operators put up toll-free emergency lines that could be easily accessed by members of the public and encourage people's participation in tackling the challenges of internal security posed by the Boko Haram sect.

Jonathan, who was represented by the Minister of Interior, Mr. Abba Moro, explained that the option was adopted by his administration because of the important role identification and reporting of suspicious activities in the fight against national insecurity plays.

According to him, the project was under the purview of the National Security Adviser (NSA), whose office, Jonathan said, was already working with the Ministry of Communi-cation to facilitate the toll-free emergency lines.

He said security was a shared responsibility and advised Nigerians to report suspicious characters to the security agencies.

"To facilitate this, the Office of the National Security Adviser is working with the Ministry of Communication to make telephone service operators provide toll-free emergency lines that are going to be very easy to remember by the public.

"Government is ready to do whatever needs to be done within the scope of the rule of law to bring about lasting peace, while laying more emphasis on intelligence-based approach to meeting our national security challenges," he said.

The new strategy, according to participants at the summit, was underscored by the tacit support Boko Haram and other similar groups enjoyed in the areas they operate.

Meanwhile, former Chief of Army Staff (CAS), Lt-Gen. Abdurrahman Bello Dambazau (rtd.), has said the recent event in Oslo, Norway has shown that security challenges are universal and not unique to Nigeria.

Speaking at the event, Dambazau said: "Every country in the world has its own security challenge. Imagine what happened in Oslo just few days back. Nigeria is not an exception, but then we have to address the problems we have in transitional societies. But these are challenges that we can always tackle. But there is no society that can be free of such challenges."

He said the issue of security was all encompassing and posed multi-dimensional challenges that could be traced to poverty, lack of education and critical infrastructure.

"The issue of security is all encompassing. There are a lot of other issues that are attached to insecurity like unemployment, poverty, education and the issue of managing critical infrastructure," he said.

Also speaking, Chairman of the occasion and General Secretary of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, Dr. Abdul-Lateef Adegbite, opposed calls for the withdrawal of soldiers from Borno State.

Adegbite said such calls were premature and do not serve the collective interest of the people and the nation as long as insecurity persists and the police continue to prove incapable in handling the situation.

"Why should they be withdrawn when there is still insecurity (in Borno State)? If the Nigeria Police is not capable, then you should let the military stay for some time," he said.

He, however, advised the Federal Government to engage in dialogue with the peaceful elements in Boko Haram while making sure that the troublemakers amongst them are rounded up to face justice.

He said: "We have suggested they should round up the troublemakers and dialogue with the ones who are peace-loving and bring them into the modern limelight. Those who are ready to sheathe their swords should be provided with education and other things. It has to be both ways. You use the stick and the carrot."

[Description of Source: Lagos This Day Online in English -- Website of the independent daily; URL: http://www.thisdaylive.com/]

Report Details Boko Haram's Origin, Meaning, Operations, Consequences

AFP20110728619001 Lagos Newswatch in English 25 Jul 11 - 01 Aug 11 14-20

[Report by Ishaya Ibrahim: "The Boko Haram Killings"]

Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, remains a killing field as soldiers deployed to the city to check Boko Haram killings are themselves being bombed and killed

For a couple of weeks now, it has been a ding-dong affair between members of the Boko Haram, the Islamic sect that abhors western education which has made Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, a killing field and members of the Joint Military Task Force [JTF] deployed by the federal government to quell the insurgency in this Northeastern state. Daily, the soldiers are being killed just as the peace keepers in turn, raid the hideouts of the militants, killing many of them.

On Tuesday, 19 Jul, as the peacekeepers patrolled the town, a gang of men suddenly threw bombs at their van about 7.40 p.m. The attack left three JTF men seriously wounded. The soldiers rounded up a few suspects and rushed the injured men to the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital. It was a lucky escape for the military men.

The attack on the soldiers was part of the series carried out by members of the Boko Haram group in Maiduguri, Borno State, which necessitated the involvement of soldiers to protect the people. Members of the sect have killed and maimed hundreds of people in the state in the past couple of months.

One sensational killing was that of a pastor of the Church of Christ in Nigeria [COCIN]. On that day, Hamman Andrew, an assistant church secretary, had noticed strange movements around the church premises. He ran to the pastor's residence to alert him. But he was too late. He was shot in the back.

The sound of the gunshot made the pastor to stagger out of his apartment. There, he saw his assistant secretary lying in the pool of his own blood. Apparently moved, the pastor threw caution to the wind and ran out to the dying man and was carrying him to his car. But half way, both of them were shot severally by the gunmen believed to be members of the Boko Haram.

They both laid dead on the floor as their killers drove away. The pastor's father, a high-blood pressure patient at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, could not survive the shock. He too died on hearing the news of his son's death. The family is now in pains and sorrow.

The sect members and residents of Maiduguri have equally got a generous dose of the JTF firepower. Saturday, 9 Jul, would be indelible in the minds of the family members of Adamu Abdullahi, an employee of the University of Maiduguri Staff Secondary School.

The military men had stormed the Kaleri area of Maiduguri, combing for Boko Haram members who had earlier in the day, launched a bomb attack against a patrol van of JTF which led to the death of some of its men. When the soldiers stormed his apartment and pounced on him, his wife screamed on top of her voice in a bid to save him.

The rampaging soldiers shoved her aside and shot her husband at close range. The shock was too much for her to bear as she collapsed instantly. When Newswatch visited their residence, one of her neighbors said that the woman was still in shock and not in the mood to talk.

These incidents capture the situation in Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State. People are killed at will. On 12 Jul, more than three bombs exploded in different locations in the state killing scores of people. Fear reigns now among the residents, forcing many to flee to neighboring states for safety.

In the past two weeks, the scenario at the Borno Express Motor Park in Maiduguri evoked both sympathy and fear as fleeing residents in their thousands rushed there, trying to catch a bus to take them outside Maiduguri at all costs. Some had passed two nights there amidst stench of urine and excrement.

The crowd at the motor park on 13 Jul was so overwhelming that no mass transit facilities could have conveyed them all within two days. But people were all desperate to leave notwithstanding the stench or filth.

One of them, a student at the University of Maiduguri, told Newswatch that he had no place to go except the motor park. His school was said to be a target of the Boko Haram though the sect's spokesman denied it. But his relations in Maiduguri had already moved to Gombe to escape the incessant bomb explosions that have become a daily occurrence in the town.

These are evidences of the extent of suffering people in the state are going through in their attempt to get out of the scene of violence in Maiduguri. Some of them walk long distances as if they are going out of the state. Adults, clutching both bags and kids battle to catch cabs.

Commercial drivers have also cashed on the situation to hike transport fares by more than 400 percent. But some of the drivers are not contented with that. In a bid to make quick money, they drive so recklessly to enable them make return trips and make more money.

This has resulted in loss of lives through by auto accidents. According to the National Emergency Management Agency and the Federal Road Safety Commission, scores of passengers have died in road crashes along the Maiduguri-Damaturu expressway in the process of trying to flee from the town. But more residents are still willing to damn the risk and go far away from bombs and gun fires that have plagued the town.

Worried by the deteriorating situation in this Northeast state, many states have come to the aid of their indigenes by sending vehicles to evacuate them. Gombe State was among the first to arrive with a fleet of about 30 buses. Kaduna State, for instance, attached a mobile police escort to each vehicle to and from Borno State to bring back indigenes of the state.

Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, and Edo States have ferried their indigenes to safety. Edo State government evacuated about 100 indigenes of the state studying at the University of Maiduguri. Also evacuated were some pupils of primary, secondary and special schools who fled the violence and carnage along with their elderly siblings.

Mohammed Ali Abdulazeez, spokesman for the evacuated students and a 400-level student of Economics, thanked Adams Oshiomhole, the governor of Edo State for acting promptly and deploying four luxury buses to Maiduguri to bring them back to the state.

He confirmed that the buses also assisted in evacuating about 50 students of Ondo State origin who were dropped off in Abuja to the embrace of their state's representatives. Abdulazeez disclosed that the rescued Edo students escaped from death and gathered at a relatively safe location away from points of exchange of gunfire from where they contacted their state governor.

"As soon as we packed our bags, some of us gathered at Elkanemi Hall from where we got in touch with the government. We could not just go out like that because the situation in Maiduguri is not conducive. It is very dangerous because whenever there is a bomb blast, soldiers would just cordon off the whole area," he said.

Kingsley Osholene, another 400-level student of Business Management, said that some of the students did not have the opportunity of taking their bath from Tuesday, 12 Jul 2011, until they got to Benin. Alex Ezekiel Ohue, a 500-level Mechanical Engineering student, commended Oshiomhole for acting quickly.

He also urged the governor to assist them financially, especially as some of the students lost their properties when their homes were burnt by Boko Haram members. The authorities of the University of Maiduguri had, in a circular signed by Babagana Aji, the registrar, ordered all students and staff members to vacate the campus immediately for safety reasons.

The circular, released on Tuesday, 12 Jul, 2011, was tagged: "Suspension of Studies in the University of Maiduguri." According to the circular, the committee of provosts, deans and directors at an emergency meeting on 11 Jul, after critically assessing the security situation in Maiduguri and its environs had on behalf of the Senate, decided to suspend studies indefinitely with effect from 12 Jul.

While receiving the students at the Government House, Oshiomhole decried the unabated bombings in Borno State and the attendant destruction of lives and properties. Residents of the town who have not fled have a lot of hardship to cope with, especially scarcity of essential products.

From bread to recharge cards, nothing is easily accessible any more in Maiduguri, which used to be the trading hub in the Northeastern part of Nigeria. Essential goods, especially food items are lacking because businesses have been grounded.

Banks do not operate for more than three hours a day. In fact, some do not open at all. And for those who visit such banks, they are only there to withdraw cash. For traders and craftsmen, whose businesses thrive only under the atmosphere of peace and tranquility, nothing could be worse.

Their businesses have been severely crippled by the upsurge of violence in the state. Reuben Hassan, a motor mechanic in Gomari area of Maiduguri, told Newswatch that he has been pauperized by the state of insecurity in the state. "At least, 9S percent of my customers have fled the town.

And even when I go to my shop, I leave at about 12 p.m. otherwise, one may get stuck in traffic jam because many people are usually on the road at that time to get home before 3 p.m. when the ban on vehicular movement takes effect," he said. Most of the days, he makes just about N1000, which, at normal times he would make in two hours.

At the Monday market, one of the major commercial centers in the town, activities have been grounded in the past two weeks due to the mass exodus of people. For several days now, the town shuts down at 12 noon.

Though the state government's restriction on vehicle movements in Maiduguri is 3 pm, people hit the road much earlier to avoid being caught in between the military law enforcers and Boko Haram fighters.

Undoubtedly, the worsening security situation has grounded the state's economy.

Newswatch learnt that a group of investors from Germany, who wanted to build a cement factory in Maiduguri, have withdrawn from the project due to the activities of Boko Haram. The group was to arrive in the state last week but shelved the plan.

Sources say that the plan of the group is to take the project to another African country. The group got the approval of the late President Umaru Yar' Adua’s government for the project and had been on it for about four years and had already finished the preliminary phase of the planning including site-clearing.

Construction work was set to begin only to be confronted by an upsurge of violence and bomb explosions. Since the military campaign, code named "Operation Restore Order" began a couple of weeks ago; Maiduguri has become a ghost town.

The exodus of residents got to its peak on Saturday, 10 Jul, when suspected members of the sect attacked the patrol van of the JTF in Kaleri, Jere local government area with an improvised explosive device. The attack led to the killing of two soldiers and injuring several others.

It was also gathered that since no resident of the area came forward with concrete information about the attackers, they were all considered to be silent collaborators. And so, the military descended on the community that same night. It was alleged that scores of youths were shot and killed.

Some residents of the community told Newswatch that the rampaging soldiers, who were angered by the loss of their colleagues, stormed their homes and ransacked everywhere. Houses and shops were razed.

At the end of the campaign that lasted throughout the night, no less than 30 residents were killed including a 13-year-old boy and Abdullahi, a staff of the University of Maiduguri.

Security operatives told Newswatch why the military did what they did. They said that the area was notorious for harboring the militants who on many occasions had attacked their agents on patrol. The source also added that those that had launched the bomb attack against the JTF patrol van that night of 9 Jul were residents of Kaleri.

He said that the JTF had no other choice but to comb the area. It was in that process that, according to him, some elements of the sect engaged them in a gun duel. In the process, some lives were lost, the source said.

On Saturday 16 July, a bomb exploded at the Bulumkutu area of Maiduguri. The residents, fearing what the JTF men might do to them, fled their homes. The deteriorating situation, especially the mass exodus of residents outside Maiduguri, has led many elders in the state to call for the withdrawal of the military.

They argued that since the commencement of the military campaign against suspected Boko Haram fighters, the security situation in the state, instead of improving, has only worsened. But Andrew Azazi, national security adviser, has argued that the removal of the military would not be a solution to the terrorism crisis in the state.