“BARBARIC” ATTACKS
Police said that “normalcy has been fully restored in the affected areas” and that security forces had increased their “presence and surveillance across Maiduguri and its environs to prevent any further occurrences”.
Borno state governor Babagana Zulum called the apparent bombings “barbaric” and said “the recent surge in attacks is not unconnected with intense military operations in the Sambisa forest”, which has a reputation as a jihadist stronghold.
An attack the previous evening was launched around midnight on Sunday on a Nigerian military post in Ajilari Cross district, a southwestern suburb of Maiduguri and just a few kilometres from the airport.
That same evening also saw an attack in Damboa area, south of Maiduguri.
Maiduguri, once the scene of daily shootings and bombings, had been relatively calm in recent years, with attacks peaking in the mid-2010s.
The last major attack was in 2021, when Boko Haram jihadists fired mortars at the city, killing 10 people.
But in December, an unclaimed bombing – again a suspected suicide attacker – killed at least seven people in a city mosque.
And in the countryside surrounding Maiduguri, violence has continued.
Last month, the United States began deploying 200 troops to Nigeria to provide technical and training support to the country’s soldiers in fighting jihadist groups.
Tinubu arrived in the UK, which is home to a very large Nigerian diaspora, on Tuesday afternoon for a two-day state visit hosted by King Charles III at which security is expected to be on the agenda.