Bomb blast 'kills at least 20' at a Nigeria bus station
Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau. Boko Haram’s seizure of a key town and military base in Nigeria’s far northeast has tightened its grip on the region, undermining efforts to tackle the insurgency, experts said on Tuesday. AFP PHOTO
What you need to know:
- The bomb was planted near a bus that was parked and filling up with passengers, said Mato Yakubu of the National Orientation Agency.
- Gombe shares a border with Borno and Yobe states, two of the areas hit hardest during Boko Haram's five-year uprising.
- The Islamists have claimed a number of attacks at bus stations, often targeting people who are heading to Nigeria's mainly Christian south.
- President Goodluck Jonathan has on several occasions claimed that Boko Haram's defeat was imminent, even as the violence escalates.
LAGOS
A bombing at a bus station in Gombe City in northeast Nigeria killed at least 20 people on Monday, the latest violence in the region repeatedly targeted by Boko Haram, the Red Cross said.
"There was an explosion at the Dukku motor park. The Red Cross mobilised with 20 body bags and they have all been exhausted," said Abubakar Yakubu Gombe, area secretary for the Red Cross.
"We are still looking for more bodies among the carnage," he told AFP.
The bomb was planted near a bus that was parked and filling up with passengers, said Mato Yakubu of the National Orientation Agency, a government body responsible for the media.
He said the blast occurred at 10.50 am (0950 GMT) at the station on the outskirts of Gombe City, capital of the eponymous state.
Gombe shares a border with Borno and Yobe states, two of the areas hit hardest during Boko Haram's five-year uprising, which has cost more than 13,000 lives.
The Islamists have claimed a number of attacks at bus stations, often targeting people who are heading to Nigeria's mainly Christian south.
LOCALS ANGRY WITH SECURITY SERVICE
Witness Awwalu Lame said a mob formed at the station shortly after the blast went off, with locals throwing stones at security officers.
Anger has risen across northern Nigeria following complaints that the security services have repeatedly failed to contain the violence.
While experts agree that isolated bombings are extremely difficult to stop, the broader military response to the extremist uprising has been widely criticised.
President Goodluck Jonathan, who is running for a second term, has on several occasions claimed that Boko Haram's defeat was imminent, even as the violence escalates.
The insurgency has forced more than 1.5 million people from their homes, straining resources in the embattled northeast, as communities struggle to care for those displaced.
Underscoring the severity of the crisis, 185 people, mostly women and children, were kidnapped on December 14 from the town of Gumsuri in Borno.
The attack recalled the kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls from a school in the town of Chibok in April 2014, a mass abduction that President Jonathan vowed would not happen again.
The president's opponent in February 2015 polls, ex-military dictator Muhammadu Buhari from the mainly Muslim north, is seen by some as better placed to contain the Boko Haram threat, but experts say he may struggle to unseat an incumbent with the backing of a wealthy ruling party.
