Timothy Olanrewaju, Maiduguri
No fewer than nine soldiers have been killed and over a dozen injured in an attack on a new military camp in Borno State. Some soldiers were also reported missing after the attack.
The insurgents attacked the new military base at Granda near Gudumbali in Guzamala Local Government northern part of Borno State at about 9.30pm on Tuesday, security sources said.
The troops were deployed from Damboa to Gudumbali last week and they had barely settled down when the insurgents struck, the sources told Daily Sun, pleading anonymity. Though troops battled the insurgents for over an hour but lost nine soldiers in the cross-fire.
Air support from the air force for the fighting soldiers could not, however, yield much impact as troops were reportedly close in battle with Boko Haram terrorists, making it difficult for the military fighter jet to shell the insurgents, a source familiar with the operation told Daily Sun.
“Nine soldiers died, some were slaughtered,” a military source said but did not give further details.
Daily Sun gathered that corpses of the slain soldiers have already been evacuated and brought to the army mortuary at the Maimalari Cantonment in Maiduguri on
Among the items allegedly carried away by the insurgents include a military petroleum tanker, an armoured vehicle, and eight other operational vehicles.
The last Tuesday incident was one in a series of attacks on military base at Gudumbali by Boko Haram in a decade of insurgency in the northeast. Roughly 145 soldiers were killed in an attack on the military location in the town on November 18, 2015. The incident was regarded as one of the deadliest Boko Haram atacks in the state since 2011 when insurgency heightened.
The military recently withdrew troops from many of its smaller locations in Borno State to bigger base called Super Camps following the introduction of a new operational concept. The new concept was randomly condemned by scores of Borno people, expressing fears the new approach could make many communities vulnerable to Boko Haram attacks. The minister of defence, Maj Gen Bashir Magashi (retd) and the Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Tukur Buratai held talks with Borno elders few days after similar meeting was organised by the Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, Maj Gen Olusegun Adeniyi at Maimalari Cantonment, 7 Division Maiduguri, Nigerian Army.