Security forces yesterday killed 20 suspected Boko Haram
militants in a shootout as they raided an Islamist hideout in Borno State, a
security officer said.

One soldier was also killed in the shootout in Maiduguri,
the Borno State capital, the officer said.

Boko Haram, an Islamist group styled on the Taliban
template, is waging an insurgency against the government with a view to
creating an Islamic state in Nigeria, a country of more than 160 million split
roughly equally between Christians and Muslims.

Security forces had intelligence that some members of the
group were holding a gathering at a location in Maiduguri, said Colonel Victor
Ebhaleme, Field Operations Officer of the military and police mixed Joint Task
Force (JTF) in Borno.

“When we approached the venue of their meeting, the
terrorists opened fire on the JTF, which led to the killing of 20 terrorists
while we lost one soldier and two others sustained injury,” he said.

Boko Haram did not comment and it was not possible to
independently confirm the report.

The Islamists have killed hundreds in gun and bomb attacks
in Nigeria, Africa’s top energy producer, since they launched their uprising in
2011.

The violence has centred on Borno State and other areas of
the predominantly Muslim north, although it has spread outwards across central
Nigeria and struck the capital Abuja in the past year.

Suspected sect members opened fire on Christian worshippers
in the central state of Kogi last Monday, killing 19.

A military crackdown on the sect in the past few months has
had mixed results, apparently weakening it but also fuelling resentment against
President Goodluck Jonathan’s government in a poor region that has often felt
left out of the country’s oil wealth, concentrated in the south.

On Saturday, Nigerian security forces discovered a
bomb-making factory in Kano, the north’s biggest city.

The death of Boko Haram’s leader in police custody in 2009
is largely seen as what triggered the uprising.

In a related development, gun battle between security forces
and suspected members of the Boko Haram sect ensued yesterday in Damaturu, the
Yobe State capital.

The Yobe State Commissioner of Police, Mr Patrick Egbuniwe,
who confirmed the incident, said intelligence reports brought to the attention
of security operatives the presence of the sect members at the Bundigari-
Powari ward of Damaturu.

The police, however, said that apart from the area, no other
place has been affected as normal activities are going on in some parts of the
state.

Mr Egbuniwe added that the extent of destruction cannot
presently be ascertained.

This gun battle in Damaturu is happening a week after a
suicide bomber ran into a military convoy, killing ten members of the Joint
Task Force (JTF) in the state capital.

It would be recalled that the convoy of the Yobe State
Deputy Governor was last Saturday mistakenly aimed at and shot by a police at
Maisandari checkpoint in Damaturu.

The incident came weeks after police on guard at the
Government House gate Damaturu shot at a driver attached to the Government
House Protocol Department while trying to enter his office.

He is still battling to survive from the three gunshots in
hospital.

It was gathered that the Deputy Governor, Engr Abubakar
Aliyu was coming back from his farm around 12:00noon when the police officer
stationed at the checkpoint opened fire at the second to the last vehicle
carrying security operatives, a development that created serious panic.

A source explained what happened: “The bullet brushed the
tyre of the security details (SSS’s) vehicle in the convoy which was directly
in front of the pilot vehicle. No life was lost and the vehicle tyre didn’t
burst.”

Yobe State Police Commissioner, Patrick Egbuniwe confirmed
that the police officer shot at the vehicle.

“The vehicle was at some distance from the Deputy Governor’s
convoy. This made the police officer suspect them and eventually shot to stop
them. We later discovered that it was an SSS vehicle,” he said.