"At least 32 people were killed in suspected bomb blasts yesterday in the central Nigerian city of Jos, where violence between Christians and Muslims has left hundreds dead this year, Police said.
More than 50 people were injured in the explosions, Abdulrahaman Akanno, Plateau state Commissioner of Police, told journalists in Jos today.
The casualty figures were earlier given as 20 dead, and more than 60 wounded, by Gregory Yenlong, a spokesman for Plateau state, who spoke in a phone interview from Jos today. The blasts took place at about 7 p.m. local time at three different locations, he said.
“For the past two weeks there have been threats to disrupt Christmas celebrations in Jos,” Yenlong said in a text message today. “We know the people and the security agencies know them. We are still investigating.”
The attackers placed the explosive devices “by the roadsides where they expected a high concentration of people,” Manasseh Panpe, Plateau Branch Secretary of the Red Cross, said by phone today from Jos.
At the Jos University Teaching Hospital, one of the places where the wounded were taken, “I saw 50 or so of them,” Panpe said. “Some of them have their lower limbs completely destroyed, and if they survive, their legs might not be useful to them again,” he said.
Act of Terrorism
The Nigerian military will enhance its intelligence operations to prevent further bombings in Africa’s most populous nation, Chief of Army Staff Lieutenant General Azubuike Ihejirika said today. The Jos bombing was an act of terrorism, Ihejirika said in the southern town of Port Harcourt, during a visit to sites of recent clashes between government forces and militants in the Niger Delta region.
Twin car-bomb blasts in the capital, Abuja, on Oct.1, left at least 12 people dead and several others wounded. The blasts occurred close to the venue of celebrations marking Nigeria’s 50 years of independence from Britain.
At least 492 people were killed in an attack on a predominantly Christian village by Muslim Fulani herders near Jos on March 7, Civil Rights Congress, a local rights group, said. Estimates for the number of people killed in sectarian clashes that broke out in Jos in mid-January ranged from 326 by the police to more than 400 by the Civil Rights Congress"
Now,my question is,how do we stop this?Knowing Jos well,it is a very nice place to be,both in location and weather.The indigenes are asking what they have done to deserve such problems. The answer of course is nothing.
The time has come to act.The earlier the better.No more 'we will get to the bottom of this' without trying.We are waiting.There is no better time for our president to prove those who doubt him wrong,than now!!!
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