* Blast hits usually peaceful Taraba state
* Sunday attacks on Christians killed at least 19
* President says “terrorists” trying to destabilise Nigeria
(Adds new death toll, Red Cross and police comment, edits)
By Ibrahim Mshelizza
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, April 30 (Reuters) – A bomb blast struck
a police chief’s convoy in eastern Nigeria on Monday, killing 11
people, a witness and an official said, a day after attacks in
other areas killed at least 19.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing
in the town of Jalingo but Islamist sect Boko Haram, which wants
to carve an Islamic state out of Nigeria, has been blamed for
many such previous attacks.
A string of bombings and shootings in the last five days has
dampened hopes that arrests and killings of Boko Haram members
by the military in recent weeks had stemmed its ability to carry
out large-scale attacks in Africa’s largest oil producer.
Jalingo is the capital of Taraba state, which borders
Cameroon and had previously been spared the insurgency plaguing
Nigeria’s north.
“At least 11 people were killed and 22 people injured near
police state headquarters Jalingo at 0830 (0730 GMT) when the
police commissioner was on his way to office,” said Ahmed Bello,
a local Nigeria Red Cross official.
He said the blast happened between the state government
finance office and the police headquarters.
Abubakar Moyoyo, a Jalingo businessman, told Reuters by
phone he had seen 11 dead bodies at the scene.
The police commissioner, Mamman Sule, said his team were
investigating whether he was the target of the attack. He
confirmed three deaths and said the windscreen of his car had
been shattered by the blast.
Nigerian police are often cautious over death tolls until
official figures are agreed with senior officers in Abuja.
In the past year, Boko Haram has tried to extend its reach
beyond its northeastern heartland, mounting attacks in and
around the capital Abuja. The Jalingo strike followed two
attacks on Christian worshippers in other parts of the country
on Sunday that killed at least 19 people.
CHURCH ATTACKS
Gunmen attacked a university theatre being used for
Christian services in the northern city of Kano and a church in
northeast Maiduguri, Boko Haram’s hometown.
The sect’s attacks have usually been on police and
government in the mostly Muslim north, but it has also
increasingly struck Christian worshippers in the past few
months.
President Goodluck Jonathan has been criticised for failing
to tackle the violence, which has gained momentum since his
presidential election victory a year ago.
He has relied mostly on a tough military approach, with
mixed results. A brief attempt at mediated dialogue with Boko
Haram broke off last month within days.
Suicide car bombers targeted the offices of newspaper This
Day in Abuja and in Kaduna last week, killing at least four
people in coordinated strikes.
“The President urges Nigerians to remain united in their
condemnation and rejection of the terrorists who have shown even
more clearly by their latest attacks on the media and the
academic community that their objective is to destabilize the
nation,” a presidency statement said on Monday.
Africa’s most populous nation, with more than 160 million
people, is split roughly equally between a largely Christian
south and a mostly Muslim north.
The unrest is piling pressure on southern Christian Jonathan
to improve security in the north and honour pledges made during
his election campaign to create jobs and reduce poverty, seen as
the main cause of unrest in the region.
Diplomats say that will be near impossible in the most
violent and impoverished northern areas, caught in a vicious
circle of poverty and insecurity.
(Additional reporting by Joe Brock, Camillus Eboh, Felix Onuah,
Afolabi Sotunde and Mike Oboh in Abuja and Bello Buhari and
Shuaibu Mohammed in Jos; Editing by Tim Cocks and Andrew Roche)
