Officials report that not less than six people have been killed in a suicide bomb attack at a main bus station in Damaturu, Yobe state capital.
File photo: At least six people have been killed in a suicide bomb attack at the main motor park in Damaturu.
Abdullahi Bego, the director media and publicity, Yobe state, who confirmed the casualty figure, said those dead have been evacuated to mortuary.
Bego said others, who were injured in the attack, are currently being attended to by health and emergency workers.
The attack which happened in the early hours of August 25 is said to have injured about 20 people.
According to witnesses, a young girl who wanted to enter the bus station was denied entry because she refused to be searched by the security guards at the entrance. Then she stepped out of the park.
Few minutes after, a private taxi drove out of the park and just as it came close to the girl, she detonated the explosives, leaving the people in the car killed.
Another source informed that there was a first bomb blast which was heard echoing in from Pompomari axis of the city. A male suicide bomber, who was said to be in his mid 20s, suddenly exploded on the street.
However, no one was affected, except himself. It was shortly after the alleged Pompomari bombing, that the incident occurred at the Damaturu motor park.
Security personnel have also succeeded in condoning the area.
The dreaded Boko Haram sect might be behind the bomb blast, though it has not been affirmed by the insurgents themselves.
Yobe state has witnessed a great deal of violent attacks by the jihadists, especially in Damaturu, the capital. There have been series of bomb blasts in the state.
Barely four weeks ago, a powerful blast hit a crowded market in Damaturu, claiming many lives. The explosion on Sunday, July 26, killed at least 15 people, including a female suicide bomber who was aged just 10. Fifty people were severely injured, most of which were admitted at the Damaturu specialist hospital.
Meanwhile, just six day earlier, there was a suicide bombing at a checkpoint on a major highway connecting Damaturu with Borno state capital Maiduguri. Officials reported that eight people lost their lives from the explosion.
Police spokesman, Toyin Gbadegesin, told the press: “Eight people including the suicide bomber died, two security operatives were among the dead.”
The sad incident at the checkpoint came three days after a bomb was detonated at the Eid-al-Fitr prayer ground in Damaturu. Another female suicide bomber was fingered to be the perpetrator. A source at the scene said that the blast killed at least six security officials, while many others were injured.
However, the Nigerian army debunked all the speculations with a more precise account that confirmed the death of 50 people in two separate Damaturu explosions. The statement issued by Sani Usman, the army spokesman, read:
“This is to confirm that there were two suicide bomb explosions today at about 7:40 in Damaturu, Yobe, in which two female suicide bombers – one elderly woman and a ten year-old girl – detonated the devices.
“It occurred at screening areas for intending Muslim worshippers at Layin Gwange, Damaturu and at Phase1, in front of former state secretariat, Damaturu.”
While 43 people died in the first explosion, seven lives were lost in the second incident.
There are several other attacks by Boko Haram in Yobe state, making the north-eastern state, one of the most volatile in Nigeria.
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