6th February, 2012
Gunmen and bombers, suspected to be militants of the Boko Haram sect have burnt down Sharada police station in Nigeria’s flashpoint city of Kano, where multiple bomb and gun attacks killed over 200 people on 20 January.
A police officer was also shot in the leg in the ensuing shootout, according to latest reports filed by the AFP.
Separately in Maiduguri,capital of Borno state and the stranglehold of the Boko Haram sect, residents reported multiple blasts at the Gamboru market that set several vehicles and shops on fire.
“I had just arrived home in time for the curfew when I heard an explosion coming from around the police station. Shortly, gunshots followed. From what I heard it sounded like a shootout,” said Bala Salisu, 46, from Kano’s Sharada district.
Authorities imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew in Kano following the January 20 attacks that primarily targetted the police, like many of the group’s recent assaults.
Another Kano resident, Sadiq Aniyu, said he was at a checkpoint not far from the police station when he “heard a huge explosion and gunshots.”
“We all panicked and it became chaotic as people on cars and on motorbikes jostled to escape the area,” Aniyu, 30, said.
Residents reported a separate gunbattle near a suspected Boko Haram hideout on the outskirts of Kano, the predominantly Muslim northern hub.
A joint military and police force raided a home in the Mariri neighbourhood sparking a shootout with the occupants, said locals who requested anonymity.
Kano police spokesman Magaji Majia told AFP he had heard reports of the attack on the Sharada police station, but said the circumstances were not yet clear.
Residents of Maiduguri, east of Kano, also reported multiple blasts at the Gamboru market that set several vehicles and shops on fire.
Maiduguri is seen as a stronghold of Boko Haram, the Islamist group blamed for a series of recent attacks in Nigeria that have killed more than 200 people already this year.
“I heard five explosions around the market and plumes of of black smoke… filled the air. The market is still on fire. Soldiers and policeman have taken over the whole area,” said resident Aisha Goni.
Colonel Victor Ebhaleme, operations chief for the Joint Task Force in Maiduguri, a special military unit set up to crack down on Boko Haram, confirmed the explosions at the market but declined to give details.
Gunmen late Sunday shot dead a secret police officer in front of his house in Nigeria’s northeastern city of Damaturu, a resident said.
The police confirmed the shooting, but said they were not sure if he was killed.
The state security service officer was “sitting outside his house with some friends this evening when two gun came through the back street in Jeri district of the town and opened fire on him and killed him,” said the resident.
Yobe police boss, Lawan Tanko, who confirmed the shooting to AFP, said he was unsure if the victim had died.
“I received the report of the gun attack on the state security service officer in Jeri. He was shot by by two gunmen outside his. It is still not clear if he was just injured or that he was actually killed,” said Tanko.
The attackers detonated some explosives to create panic and pave the way for their escape, he said. The victim’s friends ran away during the attack, the resident said.
The identity of the officer has not been disclosed.
On January 16, an unidentified gunmen shot dead three Chadian nationals in Damaturu, capital of Yobe state, near the Chadian border.
Damaturu has been hit hard by violence blamed on the Islamist group Boko Haram