By Emmanuel Nduka
Gunmen of the Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP) have killed the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of New Marte, in Marte Local Government Area of Borno State.
The DPO, a Superintendent of Police, was killed on Monday night while defending the police station at the resettled community from the terrorists who sneaked into the community on foot in the middle of the night, according to reports.
Confirming the death on Wednesday, the spokesman for the Borno State Police Command, Nahun Kenneth, said the Command is still gathering details of the attack.
A military personnel serving in New Marte told local television that the terrorists targeted one of the residents of the community who got hint and ran to the police station for protection.
The military personnel said the terrorists got into the town on foot without their usual motorcycles and vehicles.
Heritage Times HT reports that New Marte is 93 kilometers from Maiduguri, the state capital, at fringes of the Lake Chad region.
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It is a resettled community which was initially overrun by the terrorists but was rebuilt by Professor Babagana Zulum administration.
ISWAP and rival group Boko Haram still launch sporadic ambushes on convoys from their hideouts and plant landmines along the highway.
In January, 17 people were killed along the highway in two separate mine blasts that were blamed on jihadists. Ten more people were killed by a landmine in April.
While the conflict in Nigeria’s Northeast has killed 40,000 and displaced around two million from their homes since 2009, the recent military coups in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso and subsequent withdrawal of French and US troops from the Sahel to Nigeria’s north have heightened concerns over regional instability and violence extending further into coastal West African countries.
