B’Haram attacks wedding convoy, kills groom, 29 others

Gunmen suspected to be Boko Haram members  have ambushed a convoy of vehicles conveying  people returning from a wedding ceremony, killing scores of  them, including the groom in  Bulakuri village, Borno State.

The fate of  the bride and her family members was  unknown as of Sunday when Adamawa State Government Spokesman, Ahmad Sajoh, confirmed the incident to the Associated Press.

Although Sajoh  said the wedding fatiha, the official Muslim ceremony, took  place in Firgi village in   Borno State, the Agence France Presse reported that it  held in  Michika, Adamawa State.

The two news agencies however  put the    casualty figure at  30 but  an Army spokesman, Captain Muhammed, said  it was five.

“The  report received from our troops indicated that some terrorists attacked a bus at Bulakuri village and killed five persons ,” Dole said in a statement on Sunday evening, adding that the  bodies were taken to  a mortuary in Bama.

According to some of the survivors, they were attacked  along   the   Bama-Banki Road.

That road runs alongside a forest that is a known hideout of   Boko Haram terrorists.

A driver, Kyari Buba,  who   told the AFP  that he was in the middle of the convoy of about five vehicles when the gunmen struck, added  that he saw more than 30 dead bodies on the side of the road.

He  said,”  I was in the middle of the convoy when the gunmen attacked and I was able to stop my  vehicle on time to open the door and run into the bush along with the people I was with.

“When we returned long after the gunmen were gone, we met a gory scene  with more than 30 people shot dead or slaughtered.

“All the victims were brutally murdered by the attackers.”

Another  survivor and friend of the groom, Japhet Haruna, recounted his escape from the assailants.

He said, “I wonder how I and few other people survived the onslaught because it was well-coordinated. I was in the fifth vehicle in the convoy and when I realised that the attackers were out to kill, I ran into the bush.

“I believe it is God that saved me and (a) few others from their bullets. They targeted everybody in the convoy -  Muslims, Christians and children.”

Haruna said there were about 50 people in the convoy and that he suspected Boko Haram to have carried out the attack.

 The AP also quoted a  minibus taxi driver  as saying, “We saw a lot of dead bodies killed by gunshots and some by the roadside that appeared to have been slaughtered” with their throats slit.

The  driver, who asked to be identified only as Shaibu, told  journalists in    Maiduguri on Sunday,   that  his terrified passengers wanted him to turn back.

Saturday’s ambush came just over a week after suspected Boko Haram fighters launched a coordinated assault on security forces in  Damaturu,   Yobe State.

Thirty-five bodies in military uniform were brought to a morgue following the October 24 attack.

Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, had in a new video claimed  that he led the  attack.

“Look at what happened in Damaturu,” he said,   adding that  “since we killed them with our hands-  in fact,  I was the commander of the operation-    you cannot say I’m making conjecture.”

Figures released earlier this year said the Boko Haram conflict had cost more than 3,600 lives, including killings by the security forces.

Meanwhile, a  pastor of the Christ Apostolic Church, Oregbeni in Benin, Edo State, Philip Afemikhe,  was  killed on Saturday  by   gunmen.

 The hooded gunmen, who stormed the home of the popular local televangelist,   first attacked a neighbour and her daughter whom they dispossessed of their mobile telephone handsets, before breaking into Afemikhe’s room through the  window.

They    were said to have   entered his bedroom  where they  shot him dead.

Some sympathisers   said the gunmen might  have been hired killers as they allegedly left the room without taking any valuable thing.

 When contacted, the Edo State Police Public Relations Officer, Moses Eguavoen, said the police had  not been officially briefed on the matter.

source:http://www.punchng.com/news/massacre-in-bornobharam-attacks-wedding-convoy-kills-groom-29-others/