A new attack by Boko Haram on the Gartamawa community in Chibok Local Government Area, Borno State, has left twelve people dead and two injured.
Chibok LGA is 125 kilometres from Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.
It is a Southern Borno LGA whose communities have been devastated by terrorism in the past 14 years, with many abductions by the Boko Haram insurgents.
The Borno State Police Command confirmed the attack to Channels Television on Wednesday, saying the attack happened on Monday evening.
According to the Police Public Relations Officer, Nahum Daso, two others were injured when the gunmen drove into the community in Hilux vans and motorcycles in large numbers, shooting sporadically.
Though he did not provide further details of the attack, reports from residents indicate that the terrorists stormed the community, armed with rifles, shooting at mourners.
“The terrorists stormed the community of Gatamarwa around 5 p.m. on Monday during the New Year celebration, heavily armed with AK-47 rifles, came on motorcycles and Hilux vans, and opened fire on mourners returning from Gatamarwa.
“They later attacked another Tsiha community near Shikarkir and killed three people and abducted a young lady, burning houses and looting their foodstuffs,” the source said.
Monday’s incident comes about a month after four electric towers along the Maiduguri-Damaturu Highway were destroyed by the terrorists, eleven months after power was restored to Maiduguri after a similar attack in 2021.
Over the last two years, jihadists have carried out attacks beyond their stronghold in northeast Borno State, the heart of the country’s 14-year-long Islamist militant conflict.
They have increasingly targeted farmers, loggers, herders, and fishermen, accusing them of spying and passing information to the military and militia fighting them.
In 2020, Boko Haram killed 76 farmers from Zabarmari in nearby Koshobe village—a massacre that set a new standard of brutality.
Attacks from militants in Nigeria’s northeast have eased since the height of the conflict when fighters held towns and large swathes of territory. However, they still raid rural areas, hit military bases, and ambush convoys.
The insurgency crisis has killed 40,000 people and displaced around two million from their homes in the northeast since it erupted in 2009, according to the UN.
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