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Yet another successful attack has been launched in the Bama town of Borno State on Wednesday less than 24 hours after Presidential aide, Doyin Okupe said the military was winning the war against insurgents in North east Nigeria.
The attack Wednesday morning was said to have lasted about five hours and the casualty figure cannot be immediately ascertained.
A recent attack in Izge, a village in Borno State had left more than 130 persons dead and many other injured with the place now totally deserted.
Governor of the state, Kashim Shettima, held an emergency meeting with the President on Monday to seek urgent measures that would stop the wanton destruction of lives and properties in the region.
Shettima said the nation was in a state of war and that in spite of efforts by the combined team of military and police personnel, the insurgents seem to be having the upper hand as they appear better motivated and equipped that the country’s security forces.
However, Okupe, who is senior special assistant to President Goodluck Jonathan on Public Affairs criticised the governor for his remarks, insisting that the military was winning the war against terrorism in Nigeria.
“It is heartwarming that our military, which has participated in numerous international peace keeping operations where they helped to quell insurgencies, had acquired the sophistication and necessary capacity to adapt to the ever changing modus operandi of the insurgents,” he said.
Okupe added: “It is therefore wrong for anyone, Nigerian or foreigner, to assert that our armed forces cannot defeat the Boko Haram insurgents or to insinuate that the insurgents are better armed.”
Governor Shettima has called on all Nigerians to see the Boko Haram sect as a common enemy rather than a religious group going by its destruction.
“What is happening is not an ethnic or religious war. Boko Haram is a clear madness that must be condemned by all Nigerians,” he stressed.
Also, the international community has condemned, in very strong terms, the massacre carried out in Izge and has urged the federal government to bring its perpetrators to book.
The EU Commissioner for Foreign Policy, Catherine Ashton, on Wednesday described the attack as despicable.