Bauchi, Nigeria – The villagers knew an attack was coming, so they used the dark of night to ambush the suspected Boko Haram militants, killing scores and arresting at least 10 in a move to deter the extremists and make future attacks “impossible.”
Vigilante groups have been springing up in north Nigeria over the past year amid accusations the military is not acting fast enough against the Islamic extremists who are holding captive more than 270 schoolgirls.
In Kalabalge, a village about 250 kilometers (155 miles) from the Borno state capital of Maiduguri, where the terrorist network was born, residents said they took matters into their own hands.
On Tuesday morning, after learning about an impending attack by the militants, villagers ambushed two trucks with gunmen, residents and a security official told The Associated Press. At least 10
militants were detained, and scores were killed, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to give interviews to journalists. It was not immediately clear where the detainees were being held.
Kalabalge trader Ajid Musa said that after residents organized the vigilante group, “it is impossible” for militants to successfully stage attacks there.
“That is why most attacks by the Boko Haram on our village continued (to) fail because they cannot come in here and start shooting and killing people,” he said. Earlier this year in other parts of Borno, extremists launched more attacks in what some feared was retaliation over the vigilante groups.
Borno is where more than 300 girls were abducted last month and one of three Nigerian states where President Goodluck Jonathan has imposed a state of emergency, giving the military special powers to fight the Islamic extremist group, whose stronghold is in northeast Nigeria.
Britain and the U.S. are now actively involved in the effort to rescue the missing girls. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said FBI agents and a hostage negotiating team are in Nigeria now, providing technology and other materials and working with “our Nigerian counterparts to be as helpful as we possibly can.” U.S. reconnaissance aircraft are flying over Nigeria in search of the missing girls.
The group kidnapped the girls on April 15 from a school in Chibok. At least 276 of them are still held captive, with the group’s leader threatening to sell them into slavery. In a video released on Monday, he offered to release the girls in exchange for the freedom of jailed Boko Haram members.
A Nigerian government official has said “all options” are now open -including negotiations or a possible military operation with foreign help – in efforts find the missing girls.
Nigerians dressed in red shirts and holding banners that read #BringBackOurGirls marched on the streets of Abuja, the capital, Tuesday toward the governor’s lodge, calling for more to be done to secure the release of the students.
Borno state Gov. Kashim Shettima addressed the crowd after having been in Maiduguri, watching the video with parents and teachers who traveled there to identify their daughters or students.
“They were able to identify 54 students by name,” he said, adding that he had also given the military reports of sightings by villagers of the girls in the countryside.
“How do we get back our girls alive, let us not derail from that focus,” he said.
Jonathan this week sought to extend the state of emergency for six more months in the states of Yobe, Adamawa and Borno…
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