The coverage is fading, and you will soon see why:
Nigerian Honeymoon
Ended with a bang:
"Traditional Nigerian hunters to join search for kidnapped girls" by Haruna Umar | Associated Press May 20, 2014
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Traditional hunters with homemade guns, poisoned spears, and amulets have gathered in the hundreds, eager to use their skills and what they believe to be supernatural powers to help find about 300 schoolgirls abducted by Islamic extremists.
About 500 hunters, some as young as 18 and some in their 80s, say they have been selected by their peers for their spiritual hunting skills and have been waiting for two weeks in Maiduguri, the Borno state capital and the birthplace of Boko Haram, to get backing from the military and get moving. Boko Haram is accused of kidnapping the girls.
With Nigeria’s military accused by many citizens of not doing enough to rescue the girls, the hunters demonstrated their skills to a reporter Sunday. Screaming and chanting men twirled knives and swords with dexterity.
This seems a lot of effort to sell a staged and scripted hoax.
The hunters trust amulets of herbs and other substances wrapped in leather pouches as well as cowrie shells, animal teeth, and leather bracelets to protect them from bullets.
The appearance of the hunters from three northeastern states underscores how deeply the April 15 mass kidnapping — and the government’s perceived lack of action — has affected Nigerian society. It has spawned demonstrations and a tidal wave of commentary in media including social sites such as Twitter and Facebook.
A spokesman for the hunters stopped short of actually criticizing the military.
‘‘We’re not saying we are better than the soldiers, but we know the bush better than the soldiers,’’ said Sarkin Baka. The hunters said they gathered here at the suggestion of a state legislator.
A military spokesman did not immediately respond to an e-mailed question on whether it would take advantage of the hunters’ local knowledge.
In contrast to the age-old tracking skills offered by the hunters, US aircraft and camera-carrying drones are searching for the girls. Military teams from the United States, Britain, France, Spain, and Israel with expertise in surveillance, intelligence gathering, counterterrorism, and hostage negotiation are also present.
Police say that more than 300 girls and young women were kidnapped from a boarding school in the remote northeastern town of Chibok, in Borno state about 80 miles south of Maiduguri, on April 15. A total of 53 escaped and an estimated 276 remain in captivity, according to the police.
I'm tired of the false narrative, especially since the girls were released after the filming before it was retracted at someone else's request.
They were driven into the nearby Sambisa Forest, according to witnesses. Unverified reports from two federal senators from the region and Chibok residents quoting villagers in the forest and elsewhere indicated that some of the girls may have been forced to marry their abductors and some may have been taken across the border into Cameroon.
Leaders from Nigeria’s neighboring countries, including Benin, met at a French-organized summit this past weekend in Paris to coordinate curtailing the insurgency, which threatens the region. US officials also attended.
Nigeria’s military insists that it is diligently searching for the girls and says near-daily aerial bombardments of the forest that began in mid-January were stopped to avoid accidentally hitting the girls.
Related: Hillary fought to keep Boko Haram off terror list
What?
‘‘Our troops are out there combing the forests and all other possible locations searching for our fellow citizens. International support is also there assisting the process,’’ Mike Omeri, a government spokesman, said Friday.
Some parents of the abducted girls say villagers in the Sambisa Forest tell them they haven’t seen a uniformed soldier in the forest.
Why would they? Everyone knows this is a complete fraud and fiction. Why waste time with a search?
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"Police: 2 bomb blasts in Nigeria kill at least 118" by Ahmed Saka and Michelle Faul | Associated Press May 21, 2014
JOS, Nigeria — Two car bombs exploded at a bustling bus terminal and market in Nigeria’s central city of Jos on Tuesday, killing at least 118 people and wounding dozens, police said.
There was no claim of responsibility for the twin car bombs, but they bore the hallmarks of Boko Haram, an Islamic extremist group.
Translation: this was a covert western intelligence agency job.
The second blast came a half hour after the first, killing some of the rescue workers who had rushed to the scene, which was obscured by black smoke.
A hallmark of such black-op false flags.
Dozens of bodies and body parts were covered in grain that had been loaded in the second car bomb, witnesses said. A Terminus Market official said he helped remove 50 casualties, most of them dead. He spoke on condition of anonymity.
Photographs showed a woman’s body, legs blown off, on the edge of an inferno consuming other bodies, with a hand reaching out of the flames. Another woman, unconscious, was being carried away in a wheelbarrow on a road strewn with glass shards.
Tensions have been rising between Christians and Muslims in the city, the capital of Plateau state in Nigeria’s Middle Belt region that divides the country into the predominantly Muslim north and Christian south. It is a flashpoint for religious violence.
Pfft!
This stuff is really becoming unreadable.
Boko Haram has claimed other recent bomb attacks, including two separate bomb blasts in April that killed more than 120 people and wounded more than 200 in Abuja, the nation’s capital. One bomb went off at a busy bus station.
A suicide car bomber killed 25 people in northern Kano city on Monday. Police there detonated a second car bomb Monday. They said both would have killed many people but the first exploded before it reached its target of restaurants and bars in the Christian quarter of the Muslim city.
Hmmmmm!
Lipdo said at least one of Tuesday’s blasts could have been averted if authorities had acted in time.
This STINKS!
He said a white van that held the first bomb was parked for hours in the market place, raising suspicions of vendors and others who reported it to the authorities, but nothing was done.
Oh!
He said authorities also had another warning of impending violence: a man with explosives strapped to his body was arrested on Saturday and told police that many militants had been ordered to plant bombs around churches and public areas in Jos.
President Goodluck Jonathan extended sympathies to affected families and assured ‘‘all Nigerians that government remains fully committed to winning the war against terror, and this administration will not be cowed by the atrocities of enemies of human progress and civilization,’’ a statement said.
This is all just too f***ing neat, folks.
The Nigerian government and military’s failure to curtail the five-year-old Islamic uprising, highlighted by the mass abduction of nearly 300 schoolgirls and lack of progress in rescuing them more than a month later, has caused national and international outrage.
Jonathan has been forced to accept help from several nations including Britain and the United States in the hunt for the girls, who were taken in northeast Nigeria. It also has brought massive attention to the shadowy extremist group, which is demanding the release of detained insurgents in exchange for the girls — a swap officials say the government will not consider.
Meaning an agenda is being advanced. That's the only reason for the ma$$ media attention.
More than 2,000 people have been killed in the insurgency this year in Africa’s most populous nation, compared with an estimated 3,600 between 2010 and 2013.
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"Militants in Nigeria kill 48 villagers" by Ahmed Saka and Michelle Faul | Associated Press May 22, 2014
JOS, Nigeria — Islamist militants killed 48 villagers in northeastern Nigeria near the town where they kidnapped 300 schoolgirls, and the United States said Wednesday it was sending in 80 military personnel to expand the drone search for the captives.
You seeing the point to this fictitious farce now?
The developments came hours after twin car bombings killed at least 130 in this central city — an escalating campaign of violence blamed on the Boko Haram terrorist network and its drive to impose an Islamic state on Nigeria.
The three villages attacked overnight Tuesday and early Wednesday are near the town of Chibok, where the girls were abducted from their boarding school in a brazen April 15 assault that has ignited a global movement to secure their freedom.
Even the terminology has become offensive with its slant.
Michelle Obama is among those who have joined a social media campaign under the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls, tweeting earlier this month, ‘‘Our prayers are with the missing Nigerian girls and their families. It’s time to #BringBackOurGirls.’’
And time for your mass-murdering husband to stop dropping drone missiles on people and fomenting wars.
On Wednesday, President Obama said the United States was sending in 80 military personnel to help in the search for the missing schoolgirls. In a letter to House Speaker John Boehner and the Senate, Obama said the service members were being sent to Chad, which borders northeastern Nigeria, to help with intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft missions over Nigeria and the nearby region.
The US mission will help expand drone searches of the region, said Lieutenant Colonel Myles Caggins, adding that this latest deployment will not be involved in ground searches.
The drone — a Predator — will be in addition to the unarmed Global Hawks already being used, a senior US official said. The new flights will be based out of Chad and allow the military to expand its search effort, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
The government of Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan has come under intense national and international criticism for its lack of progress in rescuing the 276 schoolgirls. Besides the United States, Britain, Israel, and several other nations have offered assistance in the hunt for the girls, amid fears they would be sold into slavery, married off to fighters, or worse, following repeated threats by Boko Haram’s leader.
The insurgents have demanded the release of detained Boko Haram fighters in exchange for the girls — a swap officials say the government will not consider. Boko Haram has targeted schools, churches, mosques, marketplaces, bus terminals, and other spots where large numbers of civilians gather in its violent five-year campaign to impose Islamic law on Nigeria, whose 170 million people are half Christians and half Muslims.
Yeah, that will really win people over to your side. Why are you alleged Islamic extremists bombing mosques anyway? Why don't you find some Jews to kill?
HMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!
Yeah, I AM SICK of the ZIONIST WAR GARBAGE passing itself off as "news."
During the latest attack on three northeastern villages, terrified residents said they hid in the bush and watched while Boko Haram fighters set their thatched-roof mud homes ablaze. ‘‘We saw our village go up in flames as we hid in the bush waiting for the dawn. We lost everything,’’ Apagu Maidaga of the village of Alagarno told the Associated Press by telephone. The nearby villages of Bulakurbe and Shawa also were attacked.
In Jos, site of two powerful car bombings Tuesday in a crowded bus terminal and market, rescue workers with body bags combed the rubble for more bodies as scores of residents gathered at mortuaries and hospitals in the search for missing loved ones.
The army is on alert, the world is looking for them, and yet this happens right under their noses?
Oh, STINK, STINK, STINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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"Nigerian leader fails to meet demonstrators, raising ire" by Andrew Drake | Associated Press May 23, 2014
ABUJA, Nigeria — Scores of protesters chanting ‘‘Bring Back Our Girls’’ marched Thursday to Nigeria’s presidential villa to demand more action to free nearly 300 schoolgirls abducted by Islamic militants, but President Goodluck Jonathan did not meet with them, leaving a proxy to deliver a lecture that further angered the demonstrators.
‘‘Another small window for Jonathan and he refuses to use it!’’ one protester yelled. ‘‘What a stupid move!’’
The protesters complained of the insensitivity of Jonathan, who did not even meet some of the parents of abducted children, who came to Nigeria’s capital especially to see him this month.
Many schools across the country also closed Thursday to protest the abductions, the government’s failure to rescue them, and the killings of scores of teachers by Islamic extremists in recent years.
In Maiduguri, the northeast city that is the birthplace of Boko Haram, protesting teachers said they ‘‘can no longer tolerate government insensitivity to the plight of the girls and the education sector.’’
In Abuja, the marchers sang ‘‘All we are saying is bring back our girls,’’ to the tune of John Lennon’s iconic ‘‘Give Peace a Chance.’’
I find that piece of particular propaganda offensive in a war-promnoting piece of lying shit.
They were accompanied by police in riot gear as far as a road leading to the presidential villa, where a fire engine with a water cannon was on standby.
Cabinet ministers and aides told the small crowd of about 300 people that Jonathan was not home. A message from the president was read urging Nigerians to unite and stop criticizing the government.
These scum are the same in every f***ing country!
Murmurs of disagreement rose as they were told, ‘‘The people of Afghanistan do not blame the government. They blame the terrorists.’’
(Blog editor shakes his head and rolls eyes upward)
Civil society groups were counseled to ‘‘encourage Nigerians to supply useful information to the security services.’’
That inflamed the crowd since that is exactly what residents of Chibok did, and if the military had responded to their warnings, the girls might never have been kidnapped.
They never were; it was ALL a STAGED and SCRIPTED HOAX to INSERT the U.S. further into Africa and drive a wedge between Nigeria and China!
Chibok’s local government chairman, Bana Lawal, said he warned the army of an impending Boko Haram attack two hours before the rebels arrived. Reinforcements never arrived, leaving the road open to the school, where the extremists abducted more than 300 girls and young women. Fifty-three escaped and 276 remain in captivity, according to police.
Residents reported a similar lack of action that could have helped avert at least one of two bomb blasts Tuesday at a bustling marketplace in the central city of Jos.
The death toll has risen to at least 130, making them the deadliest bombings yet committed by Boko Haram extremists, though they have not claimed responsibility.
Market vendors said their suspicions were aroused by a white van that had been parked for hours under a pedestrian bridge, according to Mark Lipdo of the Christian charity Stefanos Foundation. He said they warned soldiers but nothing was done. The van contained the first bomb. Lipdo said there was no apparent security response to the arrest on Saturday of a man wearing a suicide bomber vest who told police that many Boko Haram fighters had orders to plant bombs at churches and public places in Jos.
The government let it happen on purpose, huh?
Jonathan and his administration are accused of showing irresponsible indifference to the plight of the abducted students and others kidnapped, and the tragedies suffered by citizens arbitrarily targeted by the Islamic extremists and abusive Nigerian security forces. The United Nations human rights commissioner has warned that it is the government’s responsibility to protect its citizens.
For years, Jonathan and his military leaders have been saying that victory is at hand against the Islamic uprising, even as the five-year insurgency has grown ever deadlier. More than 2,000 people have been killed this year, compared to an estimated 3,600 in the four previous years.
Boko Haram — the nickname means ‘‘Western education is forbidden’’ — blames Western influences for endemic corruption that keeps most Nigerians in poverty despite the country’s wealth of oil, minerals, agriculture, and a thriving movie industry.
National and international outrage at his government’s failure forced Jonathan to accept international help this month to rescue the kidnapped schoolgirls, mainly technical, intelligence-gathering, and surveillance expertise.
Eighty US Air Force personnel have arrived in neighboring Chad and begun their mission manning a Predator drone system to help locate the girls, a US military spokesman said Thursday. Manned US aircraft also are searching from a base in neighboring Niger.
I suspect that soon this story will start to fade seeing as U.S. goals have been accomplished.
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"Nigerian defense chief says abducted girls located" by Michelle Faul" Associated Press May 27, 2014
ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigeria’s military has located nearly 300 school girls abducted by Islamic extremists but fears that using force to try to free them could get them killed, the country’s chief of defense said Monday.
(Blog editor started laughing. This is turning into a really, really bad joke)
Air Marshal Alex Badeh told demonstrators supporting the much-criticized military that Nigerian troops can save the girls. But he added, ‘‘we can’t go and kill our girls in the name of trying to get them back.’’
We had to destroy the village in order to save it. You never heard of that?
He spoke to thousands of demonstrators who marched to Defense Ministry headquarters in Abuja, the capital. Many were brought in on buses, indicating it was an organized event.
We call it CONTROLLED OPPOSITION and PROPAGANDA SCRIPT!
Asked by reporters where the girls are located, Badeh refused to elaborate.
Ha-ha-ha-ha!
‘‘We want our girls back. I can tell you we can do it. Our military can do it. But where they are held, can we go with force?’’ he asked the crowd.
People roared back, ‘‘No!’’
‘‘If we go with force, what will happen?’’ he asked.
‘‘They will die,’’ the demonstrators responded.
That appeared to leave negotiation the sole option, but a human rights activist close to negotiators said a deal to swap the girls for detained Boko Haram members was agreed upon last week and then scuttled at the last minute by President Goodluck Jonathan.
But, but.... SIGH!!!!!!!!!!
The activist who is close to those mediating between Boko Haram extremists and government officials said the girls would have been freed last week Monday.
BUT?
Jonathan had already told British officials that he would not consider an exchange. The source spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.
Nigeria’s military and government have faced national and international outrage over their failure to rescue the girls seized by Boko Haram militants from a remote northeastern school six weeks ago.
President Jonathan was forced this month to accept international help. American planes have been searching for the girls, and Britain, France, Israel and other countries have sent experts in surveillance and hostage negotiation.
And still nothing, huh?
The US State Department had no immediate comment on the reports about the girls.
Jonathan’s reluctance to accept help for weeks is seen as unwillingness to have outsiders looking in on what is considered a very corrupt force.
Soldiers have said they are not properly paid, are dumped in dangerous bush with no supplies, and the Boko Haram extremists are better equipped than they are.
Who is equipping them?
Some soldiers have said officers enriching themselves off the defense budget have no interest in halting the 5-year-old uprising, which has killed thousands.
Sounds real familiar, doesn't it, Americans?
Soldiers near mutiny earlier this month fired on the car of a commanding officer who had come to pay his respects to the bodies of 12 soldiers who their colleagues said were unnecessarily killed by the insurgents in a nighttime ambush.
The military also is accused of killing thousands of detainees held illegally in their barracks, some by shooting and some by torture. Many starved to death or asphyxiated in overcrowded cells, reports said.
U.S. doesn't really make a big deal about it because Nigeria is its third-largest oil supplier.
More than 300 teenagers were abducted from their school in the town of Chibok on April 15. Police say 53 escaped and 276 remain captive.
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"Impasse in rescue of Nigerian girls" Associated Press May 28, 2014
ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigeria’s military chiefs and the president are apparently split over how to free nearly 300 schoolgirls abducted by Islamic extremists, with the military saying use of force endangers the hostages and the president reportedly ruling out a prisoner-hostage swap.
(Blog editor just shakes his head)
The defense chief, Air Marshal Alex Badeh, announced Monday night that the military has located the girls, but offered no details or a way forward.
‘‘We can’t go and kill our girls in the name of trying to get them back,’’ he said.
I'm having a Nigerian deja vu.
Previous military attempts to free hostages have led to the prisoners being killed by their abductors, including the deaths of two engineers, a Briton and an Italian, in Sokoto in March 2012.
A human rights activist close to mediators said a swap of detained extremists for the girls was negotiated a week ago but fell through because President Goodluck Jonathan refused to consider an exchange.
The activist spoke on condition of anonymity because the activist is not permitted to speak to press.
The activist is British.
Britain’s Minister for Africa, Mark Simmonds, said two weeks ago that the Nigerian leader had told him categorically he would not consider a prisoner swap.
Community leaderPogu Bitrus of Chibok, the town from which the girls were abducted on April15, said that authorities are speaking with ‘‘discordant voices’’ and that the president appears under pressure to negotiate.
‘‘The pressure is there if his own lieutenants are saying one [thing]. Because if they cannot use force, the deduction is that there must be negotiation,’’ Bitrus said. ‘‘And if their commander in chief, the president, is saying that he will not negotiate, then they are not on the same page.’’
Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno state, the birthplace of the Boko Haram extremists and the northeastern state from which the girls were abducted, said recently: ‘‘We impress on the federal authorities to work with our friends that have offered to assist us to ensure the safe recovery of the innocent girls.’’
Nigeria’s military and government have faced national and international outrage over their failure to rescue the girls who were seized by Boko Haram militants from a remote northeastern school six weeks ago.
Jonathan finally accepted international help.
American planes have been searching for the girls and Britain, France, Israel, and other countries have sent specialists in surveillance and hostage negotiation.
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"Blast in Nigeria tied to Boko Haram" | Associated Press June 03, 2014
YOLA, Nigeria — Dozens of people were feared dead in an explosion on Sunday evening in northeastern Nigeria, with Boko Haram militants believed to be behind the attack, officials said.
The attack took place near a primary school where there are also a number of beer halls in the town of Mubi in Adamawa state, one of the three states under a year-old emergency rule imposed by President Goodluck Jonathan to fight Boko Haram, which seeks to impose Islamic rule in Nigeria.
Beer halls? In an Islamic region?
Othman Abubakar, a spokesman for the Adamawa state police, confirmed the explosion but he could not say how many people had been killed or injured.
David Dauda, who witnessed the blast, said he saw at least 30 bodies after the explosion. ‘‘The blast occurred shortly after people are dispersing from a football playing ground. People gathered there to watch a football competition and just a few minutes after soldiers patrol vehicle left the place then we heard a blast,’’ Dauda said.
Nigeria’s northeastern region has suffered five years of increasingly deadly assaults by Boko Haram, whose fighters have targeted towns and villages in a string of bomb and gun attacks. At least 2,000 civilians have been killed in such attacks this year alone.
Boko Haram has claimed responsibility for kidnapping more than 300 schoolgirls in the town of Chibok on April 15. Fifty-seven girls are believed to have escaped.
Those girls are quickly become an afterthought and footnote now.
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"Report: 10 generals guilty of arming Boko Haram" by Michelle Faul | Associated Press June 04, 2014
KADUNA, Nigeria — Ten generals and five other senior military officers were found guilty in courts-martial of providing arms and information to Boko Haram extremists, a leading Nigerian newspaper reported Tuesday.
So that is where they are getting the stuff. Must be on the CIA payroll.
The news follows months of allegations from politicians and soldiers who have said that some senior officers were helping the Islamic extremists and that some rank-and-file soldiers even fight alongside the insurgents and then return to army camps.
They have said that information provided by army officers has helped insurgents in ambushing military convoys and in attacks on army barracks and outposts in their northeastern stronghold.
Leadership newspaper quoted one officer saying that four other officers, in addition to the 15, were found guilty of ‘‘being disloyal and for working for the members of the sect.’’
A Defense Ministry spokesman, Major General Chris Olukolade did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.
Last week, he denied that senior military officers were being investigated for helping Boko Haram and sabotaging a year-old offensive to curb the five-year-old uprising that has killed thousands.
Boko Haram has attracted international condemnation and UN sanctions since its April 15 abduction of more than 300 schoolgirls, of whom 272 remain captive.
Nigerian activists pressing the government to rescue the schoolgirls filed a complaint Tuesday against a police ban on protests.
‘‘We filed a complaint that the police don’t have any right to stop people from expressing themselves,’’ said community leader Pogu Bitrus of Chibok, the town from which the girls were abducted.
The protests have ‘‘degenerated’’ and are ‘‘now posing a serious security threat,’’ Abuja Police Commissioner Joseph Mbu said in a statement Monday banning all protests in the capital related to the topic.
The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project, said such a ban violates basic rights under the Nigerian constitution.
However, Nigerian police said on Tuesday they had not ordered a ban on peaceful assemblies or protests in Nigeria.
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Also see:
Politicians, friends seek to save Sudanese wife of N.H. man
They went to Nigeria for their honeymoon?
"3 Catholic missionaries freed in Cameroon" Associated Press June 02, 2014
ROME — Two Italian priests and a Canadian nun have been freed two months after they were abducted in northern Cameroon by armed groups, the Vatican and the Italy’s Foreign Ministry said Sunday.
Gianantonio Allegri, Giampaolo Marta, and Gilberte Bussier were kidnapped April 5. The Italian Foreign Ministry thanked Canadian and Cameroon authorities, but didn’t say where or when the abduction ended. At the time of the abductions, Vatican Radio said it wasn’t ruled out that Boko Haram, an extremist Islamic group, might have been behind their kidnappings.
I suppose we can blame Boko Harem for everything.
Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said Pope Francis had followed the case from the beginning.
‘‘We thank the Lord that this case reached a positive conclusion,’’ Lombardi said, adding a thought for others who have been abducted in conflict zones. ‘‘At the same time, we continue to pray and commit ourselves so that every form of violence, hate, and conflict in various regions of Africa and in other parts of the world can be overcome.’’
Boko Haram’s five-year-old Islamic uprising based in northeastern Nigeria has claimed the lives of thousands of Muslims and Christians, including more than 1,500 people killed in attacks this year. A French priest abducted in northern Cameroon late last year was released in January, though there was never any claim of responsibility.
I was told over 2,000, but why quibble about ma$$ media inaccuracy?
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I'm ready for a divorce from the Boston Globe.
