Thursday, December 31, 2015
Video - Nigeria begins countdown to 2016
Billions worldwide are preparing to welcome the New Year. But where in Africa should you go to party? Our correspondents across the continent have been searching for the best New Year's Eve venue. Here's where you should be if you are in Nigeria.
President Muhammadu Buhari ready to negotiate with Boko Haram for 200 kidnapped schoolgirls
Nigeria's president has said he is prepared to negotiate with Boko Haram militants to secure the release of about 200 schoolgirls.
Muhammadu Buhari said that if a credible Boko Haram leadership could be identified then he was prepared to talk with them without preconditions.
But he said he had no intelligence on the girls' whereabouts or their health.
Boko Haram seized the girls from their dormitories in the north-eastern town of Chibok in April 2014.
"If a credible leader of Boko Haram can be established and they tell us where those girls are, we are prepared to negotiate with them, without any precondition," said Mr Buhari.
Attempts to negotiate with Boko Haram during the rule of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan failed because officials were talking to the wrong people in the fragmented militant group.
BBC Nigeria analyst Naziru Mikailu says this is not the first time that Mr Buhari has offered to revive talks, but there is little prospect of the militants agreeing.
The militants regard the girls as their most invaluable captives and their leader, Abubakar Shekau, said last year that most of them had converted to Islam and had been married off.
Some Nigerians on social media expressed anger at the president for saying the government had no idea where the girls were being held, saying it indicated a failure of the intelligence services.
Mr Buhari took office in May with a promise to defeat the group, and gave the military a deadline of the end of the year to end the six-year insurgency.
Last week, he told the BBC that government forces had "technically won the war" against the Islamists.
Although Boko Haram has been driven out from most of the areas it controlled in north-eastern Nigeria, it has continued to carry out suicide bombings and raids into neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
The military has managed to free hundreds of Boko Haram captives in recent months.
However, they did not include any of the Chibok girls.
BBC
Muhammadu Buhari said that if a credible Boko Haram leadership could be identified then he was prepared to talk with them without preconditions.
But he said he had no intelligence on the girls' whereabouts or their health.
Boko Haram seized the girls from their dormitories in the north-eastern town of Chibok in April 2014.
"If a credible leader of Boko Haram can be established and they tell us where those girls are, we are prepared to negotiate with them, without any precondition," said Mr Buhari.
Attempts to negotiate with Boko Haram during the rule of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan failed because officials were talking to the wrong people in the fragmented militant group.
BBC Nigeria analyst Naziru Mikailu says this is not the first time that Mr Buhari has offered to revive talks, but there is little prospect of the militants agreeing.
The militants regard the girls as their most invaluable captives and their leader, Abubakar Shekau, said last year that most of them had converted to Islam and had been married off.
Some Nigerians on social media expressed anger at the president for saying the government had no idea where the girls were being held, saying it indicated a failure of the intelligence services.
Mr Buhari took office in May with a promise to defeat the group, and gave the military a deadline of the end of the year to end the six-year insurgency.
Last week, he told the BBC that government forces had "technically won the war" against the Islamists.
Although Boko Haram has been driven out from most of the areas it controlled in north-eastern Nigeria, it has continued to carry out suicide bombings and raids into neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
The military has managed to free hundreds of Boko Haram captives in recent months.
However, they did not include any of the Chibok girls.
BBC
Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Video - Calabar carnival in Nigeria
Hundreds of brightly coloured dancers and drummers have been taking part in Nigeria's Calabar Carnival. [TAKE VO] Its been described as Africa's Biggest Street Party. The 12-kilometre carnival walk had participants from Nigeria's different communities, as well as some performers from abroad.
Monday, December 28, 2015
A wave of suicide bombings hit Nigeria
A wave of attacks by female suicide bombers in north-eastern Nigeria has killed more than 50 people.
In the latest blasts two bombers struck a market in the town of Madagali in Adamawa state, an army official said. More than 25 people were killed.
In neighbouring Borno state, several attacks in Maiduguri killed more than 30 people and injured over 100.
Last week, Nigeria's leader said the war against Islamist Boko Haram militants had been "technically won".
The attacks are being blamed on the group.
The BBC's Abdullahi Kaura Abubakar in the capital, Abuja, says Boko Haram jihadists appear to be trying to prove that they can still inflict widespread destruction.
President Muhammadu Buhari, who took office in May promising to defeat the group, told the BBC last week that the militants could no longer mount "conventional attacks" against security forces or population centres.
It had been reduced to fighting with improvised explosives devices (IEDs), he said.
The twin suicide blasts in Madagali were confirmed by the Adamawa state military chief, Brig-Gen Victor Ezugwu.
Maina Ularamu, a community leader and former local government chairman, told AFP two female suicide bombers killed at least 30 people.
'Fired indiscriminately'
Further north, during an attack on Dawari village on the outskirts of Maiduguri, security forces had intervened and killed 10 suicide bombers, spokesman Col Mustapha Anka said.
Residents said militants armed with rocket-propelled grenades drove into the village in trucks and began firing indiscriminately.
Muhammad Kanar, from the National Emergency Management Agency, told the BBC the injured had been taken to three hospitals in the city for treatment.
Hours later a female suicide bomber killed one person as people queued in the morning by a mosque in the city.
A resident in Maiduguri's Ushari Bulabulin district, who asked not to be named, told the BBC Hausa Service: "People were being scanned before they were allowed to pass, and she went into the middle of the gathering. She killed one person and injured six or seven...
"We cannot see the lower part of her body - the bomb must have completely destroyed the lower part of her body," he said.
The military has not commented on the latest attack on the mosque, which is believed to be about a kilometre from the village.
Boko Haram's six-year insurgency in north-eastern Nigeria has led to the deaths of some 17,000 people, destroyed more than 1,000 schools and displaced more than 1.5 million people.
It has been described as one of the world's deadliest terror groups.
Only a few days ago, Islamic State, to whom Boko Haram is affiliated, said its West Africa division had launched more than 100 attacks - killing more than 1,000 people - over the past two months, the Site Intelligence Group, with monitors jihadist websites, reported.
Critics of the government argue that it has exaggerated the scale of its success against the militants, and that each time the army claims to have wiped out Boko Haram, the militants have quietly rebuilt.
BBC
In the latest blasts two bombers struck a market in the town of Madagali in Adamawa state, an army official said. More than 25 people were killed.
In neighbouring Borno state, several attacks in Maiduguri killed more than 30 people and injured over 100.
Last week, Nigeria's leader said the war against Islamist Boko Haram militants had been "technically won".
The attacks are being blamed on the group.
The BBC's Abdullahi Kaura Abubakar in the capital, Abuja, says Boko Haram jihadists appear to be trying to prove that they can still inflict widespread destruction.
President Muhammadu Buhari, who took office in May promising to defeat the group, told the BBC last week that the militants could no longer mount "conventional attacks" against security forces or population centres.
It had been reduced to fighting with improvised explosives devices (IEDs), he said.
The twin suicide blasts in Madagali were confirmed by the Adamawa state military chief, Brig-Gen Victor Ezugwu.
Maina Ularamu, a community leader and former local government chairman, told AFP two female suicide bombers killed at least 30 people.
'Fired indiscriminately'
Further north, during an attack on Dawari village on the outskirts of Maiduguri, security forces had intervened and killed 10 suicide bombers, spokesman Col Mustapha Anka said.
Residents said militants armed with rocket-propelled grenades drove into the village in trucks and began firing indiscriminately.
Muhammad Kanar, from the National Emergency Management Agency, told the BBC the injured had been taken to three hospitals in the city for treatment.
Hours later a female suicide bomber killed one person as people queued in the morning by a mosque in the city.
A resident in Maiduguri's Ushari Bulabulin district, who asked not to be named, told the BBC Hausa Service: "People were being scanned before they were allowed to pass, and she went into the middle of the gathering. She killed one person and injured six or seven...
"We cannot see the lower part of her body - the bomb must have completely destroyed the lower part of her body," he said.
The military has not commented on the latest attack on the mosque, which is believed to be about a kilometre from the village.
Boko Haram's six-year insurgency in north-eastern Nigeria has led to the deaths of some 17,000 people, destroyed more than 1,000 schools and displaced more than 1.5 million people.
It has been described as one of the world's deadliest terror groups.
Only a few days ago, Islamic State, to whom Boko Haram is affiliated, said its West Africa division had launched more than 100 attacks - killing more than 1,000 people - over the past two months, the Site Intelligence Group, with monitors jihadist websites, reported.
Critics of the government argue that it has exaggerated the scale of its success against the militants, and that each time the army claims to have wiped out Boko Haram, the militants have quietly rebuilt.
BBC
Thursday, December 24, 2015
Video - Human rights group accuses Nigerian military of killing unarmed children
According to the Human Rights Watch, Nigerian soldiers fired on unarmed Shiite children with no provocation before unjustified raids that killed hundreds. The charges come as the guardian of Nigeria's estimated 80 million-plus Muslims, Sultan Muhammad Sa'ad Abubakar of Sokoto, warned the government against actions that could radicalize other Muslims in a country that has already lost 20,000 lives to the Boko Haram Islamist uprising.
Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday it doubts the Nigerian military's version of events which claims that raids over three days on three Shiite locations in northern Zaria town followed an attempted assassination of the army chief.
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