Bomb blasts have killed at least two people in northeastern Nigeria, the latest unrest to hit Africa’s most populous nation after presidential elections and ahead of state governorship polls.
Police had so far counted at least two dead and eight wounded, while saying they suspected the Islamist sect known as Boko Haram was behind the attacks on Easter Sunday night in the city of Maiduguri. It was unclear whether the blasts were linked to the unrest that swept across Nigeria’s north last week, leaving more than 500 dead according to a local rights group.
Maiduguri has long been hit by violence blamed on the Islamist sect, which launched an uprising in 2009, and police said they suspected the group was behind Sunday’s bomb blasts at a hotel tavern and at the gate of a transport hub. The explosions, which police said were caused by bombs, occurred nearly simultaneously, with the two locations not far apart. Two blasts hit the hotel and one hit the station for buses and communal taxis. “So far we have two dead and eight injured from last night’s blast,” police commissioner Mike Zuokumor told AFP. All the casualties were reported at the hotel, he said. Police spokesman Mai Mamman said earlier that “from all indications, this is the handiwork of Boko Haram, which has carried out similar attacks in the past.”
The sect known as Boko Haram is seen as opposed to the ruling party in Borno state, where Maiduguri is the capital, and some of the recent violence blamed on the group is believed to have been politically motivated. Most of Nigeria’s 36 states will hold governorship elections on Tuesday, including Borno, where the All Nigeria Peoples Party is in power. The party controls three states in Nigeria. “We have placed our men on the alert for the governorship tomorrow. We will not be daunted by terrorists,” said Zuokumor. Boko Haram had distributed fliers earlier Sunday warning of further attacks, saying “we are fighters waging jihad in Nigeria.” “We will never accept any system of governance apart from the one described by Islam because that is the only way Muslims can be liberated,” the fliers said. “We do not respect the Nigerian government because it is illegal.
“We will continue to fight its military and police because they are not protecting Islam.” The sect launched an uprising in 2009 put down by a brutal military assault that left hundreds dead. In recent months, it has been blamed for a series of attacks and shootings, most of them in Maiduguri. Boko Haram is “Western education is sin” in the local Hausa language, though the group has gone by various names.