JONATHAN IN GOMBE—Emir of Gombe, Alhaji Abubakar Shehu Abubakar III, welcoming President Goodluck Jonathan during the visit of the Pdp Presidential Campaign Organization to the Emir’s Palace in Gombe, yesterday. Behind the President are PDP Chairman, Adamu Mu’azu, and Gombe State Governor, Ibrahim Dankwambo. Photo: State House.
A bomb exploded at a car park outside Gombe Stadium where President Goodluck Jonathan had addressed a campaign rally barely three minutes after he left, sending shock waves across the capital city of Gombe State.
Rescue workers and health officials said the bodies of two women were brought to the Gombe State Specialist Hospital with 18 people who were injured.
We have evacuated two bodies of females we believe were suicide bombers behind the blast,” said the rescue official, who asked to remain anonymous because he was not authorised to speak to media.
One of the bodies is suspected to be that of the female bomber.
The Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) in the state, DSP Fwaje Atajiri, confirmed the deaths, but gave the number of injured as six.
Atajiri, however, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the blast occurred near a carpenter’s shop in Kashere Street at the Water Board area in Gombe city and not at the campaign rally.
Coordinator of the National Information Centre, Mr. Mike Omeri, who confirmed the blast also disclosed that the African Union Peace and Security Council had approved the mkobilization and immediate deployment of 7,500 troops to Nigeria to fight Boko Haram.
The blast occurred in Gombe on a day explosion rocked three court premises in Rivers State with one of the affected courts burnt down by fire.
An eyewitness to the blast in Gombe, Mohammed Bolari, who was at the rally, said the explosion happened at 3:10 pm, three minutes after President Jonathan’s departure.
According to him, “the President had just passed the parking lot and we were trailing behind his convoy when the explosion happened, just 100 metres from the bus we were driving in.”
Jonathan’s appearance in the city came just a day after two blasts in the city, including one that targeted a military checkpoint. At least five people were killed.
The blast, confirmed by eyewitnesses including a local reporter following the presidential convoy, came a day after two explosions in Gombe city blamed on Boko Haram militants.
Sunday’s attacks left at least five people dead in a weekend of deadly violence that also saw the Islamists attack the key city of Maiduguri for the second time in a week.
Nigerian troops, aided by civilian vigilantes, repelled the attack while Chad and Cameroon bombed the Boko Haram-held town of Gamboru, on the eastern fringe of Borno State.
According to AFP, security analysts believe Maiduguri, the Borno state capital, will likely be hit again before polling day, given its symbolism for the group and because it would undermine the Feb 14 vote. The election is expected to be the closest since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999, with the prospect of the PDP being dumped out of power for the first time in 16 years.
Nnamdi Obasi, Nigeria researcher at the International Crisis Group, said the upsurge in violence was “predictable” and that another strike on Maiduguri was on the cards.Boko Haram is in control of most of Borno and has effectively surrounded Maiduguri, which is seen as one of the few places left in the state where voting could feasibly still take place.
Turnout could be affected if large numbers of people, many of them displaced by six years of violence, desert the city, which with other areas in the northeast is a main opposition
