By Camille Malpat with Aminu Abubakar in Kano, Nigeria: Political leaders in Nigeria are urging President Bola Tinubu to reconsider a threatened military intervention against junta leaders in neighbouring Niger, ahead of a Sunday deadline to reinstate the country's...
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Nigeria grapples with end of fuel subsidy
By Alexandre Martins Lopes: Nigerians are struggling with surging fuel prices after newly elected President Bola Tinubu declared an end to popular subsidies, a move analysts and experts said was long overdue. On his first day in office, Tinubu kept to his campaign...
Nigeria: Bandits raid six villages in north, kill 30 civilians
Armed men killed 30 people in weekend raids on six villages in Nigeria's north, a region regularly hit by criminal violence and clashes between communities, local police have said. The bloodshed is the latest outbreak of inter-communal violence which the country's...
Nigeria: ISWAP ambushes army unit, kills several soldiers
Several Nigerian soldiers died in an attack on a military convoy in the Lake Chad region by jihadist fighters aligned with the Islamic State group, security forces said Tuesday. The convoy was hit by militants from the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP)...
Nigeria: Human Rights Watch accuses Nigeria army over civilian drone strike victims
A leading rights group urged Nigeria's army on Tuesday to take responsibility for a drone strike that killed 39 civilians in January, calling for compensation for the victims and their families. The army eventually admitted ordering the strike near the town of Rukubi,...
Nigeria: Cash-strapped Boko Haram kidnaps herders for ransom
Boko Haram jihadists have kidnapped 30 ethnic Fulani herders near northeast Nigeria's Lake Chad, demanding ransom for their release, fishermen and the head of an anti-jihadist militia told AFP Tuesday. The militants in eight boats stormed the fishing and herding...
Growing pressure on army Chief of Staff Tukur Buratai to resign
Posted On 21 July 2020
Abuja, July 21, 2020 – Nigerian senators on Tuesday passed a resolution demanding military chiefs resign for failing to stem widespread insecurity. Africa’s most populous nation is struggling with a decade-long Islamist insurgency in the northeast and bloody attacks by armed gangs in the northwest. “The Senate has called on the Service Chiefs to step aside over the deteriorating security situation in the country,” the senate president’s office said in a statement.
The military top brass has faced widespread criticism over the bloodshed despite claims the armed forces are bringing the situation under control. President Muhammadu Buhari has stuck by Chief of Staff Tukur Buratai in the face of repeated demands for him to go.
Buhari’s office insisted that sacking the military bosses remained a “presidential prerogative” and the leader “will do what is in the best interest of the country at all times”. Nigeria’s army has also sustained heavy losses. Earlier this month jihadist fighters linked to the so-called Islamic State group killed dozens of troops in the northeast of the country, while on Saturday at least 23 soldiers were killed in an ambush by armed criminals in Katsina state, in the northwest.
The insurgency launched by Boko Haram jihadists 10 years ago in northeast Nigeria has killed 36,000 people and forced around two million from their homes.
AFP
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