Two explosions ripped through components of Kaduna in Kaduna State on Wednesday, killing at least 70 people.
The first explosion targeted a popular Islamic cleric, Dahiru Bauchi, while the second targeted a former Head of State, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.).
Both men eluded unhurt in the blasts that coerced the state regime to impose a circadian curfew on the city.
Scores of people were injured and over 50 cars damaged in the incidents. The state police command put the death toll at 40 while the Federal Regime, through the National Information Centre, verbally expressed 14 people were injured.
Two of Buhari’s bodyguards and an aide were among the wounded. His Toyota Prado jeep was withal hit by a suspected bomber near the 1 Mechanised Division of the Nigerian Army in the Kawo area of Kaduna.
There were two accounts of how the bomber assailed the motorcade of Buhari, who is withal one of the national bellwethers of the All Progressives Congress.
While one had it that the bomber, on sighting Buhari’s convoy hauled explosives at it, the second claimed that the bomber rammed his Toyota Sienna into the motorcade.
An eyewitness, who gave his denomination simply as Idris verbalized, “The suicide bomber hauled explosives at the convoy of the former Head of State but one of the cars in the convoy and a Toyota Prado conveying Buhari were hit.
“He was shielded into a Toyota Sienna that took him away from the scene.”
Another witness, who did not optate his denomination in print, verbalized the bomber rammed his conveyance into the convoy of the general, hitting his jeep and others cars.
“In fact, a car in the convoy was deplorably damaged. Buhari eluded narrowly. We doubt if his security operatives eluded unhurt”.
On the diligent Alkali Road in the city centre where the first bomb targeting Bauchi exploded, one of our correspondents optically discerned body components and damaged cars littering the area.
Bauchi had distributed a Ramadan lecture (Tafsir) at the Murtala Square and was driving through the area in an open-roofed conveyance, greeting well-wishers when his assailant struck.
Eyewitness verbally expressed the lone bomber,who rode on a motorbike followed the convoy of the cleric after the lecture. He was verbally expressed to have been blocked by security operatives who suspected him but he coerced his way through the crowd and detonated his explosive.
Security operatives were visually perceived conveying the wounded to a nearby hospital and the Nigerian Army Reference Hospital for treatment.
Efforts by one of our correspondents to contact Bauchi failed as he was verbalized to have been peregrinate to an unknown location.
Followers of the renowned cleric reacted angrily, throwing stones at security operatives and incriminating them of failing to bulwark Nigerians.
The security forces retaliated by firing tear gas canisters.
However, state Police Commissioner, Shehu Umar, put the death toll in the first blast at 25 and 14 in the second.
Umar verbalized, “For now, we have recorded 25 dead bodies. People had just closed from the Ramadan Tsafir led Sheik Bauchi, and we provided enough security at the Murtala Square, the venue of the Tafsir, but the bomb was planted far away from the venue, to target him through the route he was taking home.
“We are doing our best to safeguard the country, so we are appealing to the perpetrators to lay down the arms.”
•Yero orders circadian curfew
Governor Muktar Yero,who condemned the blasts, explicated that the curfew was imposed to enable security operatives to instaurate normalcy to the city.
Yero, in a verbalization by his Director-General, Media and Public Affairs, Mallam Ahmed Mayaki, described the bomb blasts as the height of “cowardice” by those bent on engendering tension in the state.
The governor verbalized the explosions were a clear manifestation of the resolve by “agents of darkness” to soak the land with the blood of innocent people for no just cause.
He verbalized, “Enemies of tranquility have visited us with their wanton eradication of human lives. These blasts, coming in the Holy Month of Ramadan are a clear denotement that those abaft them have no trepidation of God in them.”
The governor advised the people of the state to be more vigilant with happenings around them and to withal evade crowded places.
He verbalized, “The time has come for us to eschew all our differences and confront these brazen attacks as amalgamated people.
“Those abaft these assailments have no regard for whatever diversity as their victims cut across all ethnic and religious divides. It is a responsibility on all of us to amalgamate against this mundane enemy.”
While commiserating with the families of the victims, the governor additionally enjoined the people to provide information on suspicious forms of kineticism and persons within their communities.
•Buhari alleges assassination endeavor
Buhari, in a verbal expression personally signed by him, alleged an endeavor to assassinate him.
He verbalized he was peregrinating to Daura in Katsina State when the bomber struck at about 2.30pm.
The APC bellwether integrated that his security details were affected by the blast but “I emerged unhurt.”
The verbalization read, “I was personally involved in a pellucidly targeted bomb attack today (Wednesday) at about 2:30pm peregrinating to Daura.
“The lamentable event, pellucidly an assassination endeavor emanated from an expeditious moving conveyance that made many endeavors to overtake my security car, but was blocked by an escort conveyance.
“We reached the market area of Kawo where he capitalized on our decelerating and endeavored to ram my car and instantly detonated the bomb which ravaged all the three cars in our convoy.
“Unfortunately, when I emerged from my conveyance, I visually perceived many dead bodies littered around. They were innocent people going about their quotidian business who became victims of a mass murder.
“Thank God for His mercy, I emerged unhurt, but with three of my security aides sustaining minor injuries. They have since been treated in a hospital and discharged.”
The Chairman of NIC and Director-General of the National Orientation Agency, Mr. Mike Omeri, verbalized 25 people died in the blasts and 14 injured.
Omeri verbally expressed, “It (first blast) transpired around 12.10pm. It was a conveyance parked among conveyances. Towards the cessation of the Ramadan expeditious, special prayers are offered by Muslims. At the terminus of it, while people were dispersing, the explosion occurred.
“About 25 persons have been reported dead. Fourteen others suffered different degrees of injury. They are receiving treatment. Security forces and emergency accommodations mobilised to the area. This underscores our perpetual call for citizens to be vigilant as security forces intensify efforts to stop this menace.
“As we were about to peregrinate here we learnt that another explosion occurred in Kaduna.
When asked if Boko Haram was responsible for the blasts, Omeri replied, “Whoever it is, whether it is Boko Haram or not; we ken that our people are being assailed and the regime is doing everything possible to stop it.
“That is the issue with insurgency. It is betokened to harass citizens. It expounds the heinous nature of this menace; women and children are subjected to torture through explosions. It should be condemned by all citizens and we should stand together to find a solution to it.”
Additionally, the Deputy Director, Public Relations at the Department State Security, Ms. Marylyn Ogar, verbally expressed the bomb utilized in the first attack was detonated by a remote control.
She verbally expressed, “Sheik Bauchi customarily holds annual Ramadan prayers. His convoy missed being hit by a whisker. We will not be presumptuous by saying that he was targeted. Investigations are perpetual. If we have enough details to substantiate that he was targeted, it does not transmute anything.
“The fact still remains that we must remain very, very vigilant. In this particular incident, the bomb was laden in a Peugeot J5 and it was remotely detonated. That is why we insist that we must be remotely conscious of our environment.”
•Jonathan thanks God for sparing Buhari’s life
President Goodluck Jonathan however condemned the bombings and thanked God for sparing Buhari and Bauchi, who were verbalized to be the targets.
Jonathan, in a verbalization by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, denounced the targeting of political and religious bellwethers by terrorists.
He verbally expressed he had directed the police and other security agencies to take all compulsory actions to apprehend the perpetrators of the assailments.
The verbal expression read, “President Jonathan condemns the bombings in Kaduna today (Wednesday) which appeared to have targeted a former Head of State,Maj.Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, and a prominent Islamic cleric, Sheikh Dahiru Bauchi.
“The President denounces the dastardly targeting of the prominent political and religious bellwethers by terrorists and enemies of the nation in an odious endeavor to inflame passions and exacerbate disquiet, fear, insecurity and sectional divisions in the country.
“While thanking God Almighty for sparing the lives of Gen. Buhari and Bauchi, the President elongates sincere condolences to the families of those who were killed by the bomb blasts.
“President Jonathan additionally commiserates with all those who were injured in the twin bombings in this Holy Month of Ramadan which defy the tenets of Islam, and provide further proof that the terrorists are nothing but blood-thirsty extremists bent on undermining the unity and progress of the nation.”
•Sultan, ACF condemn blasts
The Sultan of Sokoto-led Jama’atu Nasril Islam additionally condemned the twin bomb blasts and called on the ascendant entities concerned to elevate to the responsibility of bulwarking Nigerians.
JNI, in a verbal expression by its Secretary-General, Dr. Khalid Aliyu, advised that all hands must be on deck to stop the massacre of Nigerians by terrorists.
The verbalization read, “We are dazed by the news of the twin blasts in Kaduna city, which claimed the lives of many innocent Muslims.
“We therefore condemn in the most vigorous terms, these reiterated acts of terror being unleashed on Muslims, in this mystically enchanted month of Ramadan. JNI equipollently sympathises with all the affected victims and withal consoles the families of those who lost their lives in the lamentable incidents. May Aljannatul Firdaus be the abode of all the deceased.
“As conventional, JNI calls on all ascendant entities concerned to be more committed to their responsibilities of forfending the lives and properties of Nigerians as no development can be achieved in an atmosphere of trepidation, insecurity and chaos.
“All hands must be on deck to stop this perpetual massacre of people and ravagement of properties.
“Muslims should utilise the remaining days of Ramadan to repine to Allah, The Most Merciful, through vigorous supplications for palliation, succour and facilitate against the masterminds of the nagging insecurity bedevilling our country.”
The Arewa Consultative Forum described the explosions as a national calamity and called on the Federal Regime “to decisively utilize all legitimate betokens and security apparatus at its disposal to tackle the insecurity that is gradually ravaging our nation.”
The ACF, in verbalization by its National Publicity Secretary, Muhammad Ibrahim, integrated that “the present insecurity situation in the country, especially in the North, has placed our people in a state of despair and helplessness, it has additionally crippled the socioeconomic activities of the region.”
It advised that synergy between security agencies and other organs of the society in the area of perspicacity accumulating and utilisation was obligatory in combating terrorism in the country.
The group verbalized, “The twin bomb blasts in Kaduna that killed hundreds of innocent people and injured many amounted to a national calamity, a disservice to humanity and a great shock to the nation, especially in this Holy month of Ramadan.”
The forum appealed to the terrorists in the country to lay down their arms and embrace dialogue.
It called on the Kaduna State Regime to “swiftly investigate these maleficent acts of terrorism against the people of Kaduna that have witnessed relative placidity in the last two years.”
Additionally, members of the Buhari Vanguard verbally expressed they were shocked that the blasts targeted Buhari and Bauchi.
