Based on figures obtained from physicians, the National Emergency Management emergency reported at least 86 dead in violence that took place before Christmas in the center of the country. REUTERS / AFOLABI SOTUNDE The stock of communal violence in Nigeria Christmas has more than doubled Tuesday, December 28, weighed down with 86 deaths, according to the latest figures from the National Agency for Emergency Management.In Jos, a city in central Nigeria hit by a bomb, then retaliation, the toll was 80 dead and 189 wounded, according to the agency, which says its figures are accurate because based on information gathered from hospitals. Police continue to say that the record is much lower. Six other people also died Friday, Christmas Eve, in the north, in further violence and burning of churches.
The Islamic sect Boko Haram claimed the violence on a website. An Islamist group, which might be the sect Boko Haram, author of a deadly uprising in 2009, claimed the attacks and threatened to continue its work on a website it is supposed to control. "O nations of the world, be advised that the attacks Suldaniyya (Jos) and Borno, on the eve of Christmas, have been committed by us, Jama'atu Ahlus-Sunnah Wal Lidda'Awati Jihad, led by Abu Muhammad Abubakar bin Muhammad Shekau, "the statement said.
The name of the sect stands for "People dedicated to the teachings of the Prophet for the propagation and holy war (jihad). Suspected members of the Islamic sect Boko Haram, who was raised last year in Nigeria, said in the past will now bear the name. In recent years, clashes between communities have left hundreds dead in central Nigeria, a region on the border between northern, predominantly Muslim, and South, mostly Christian.
But the bombing on Friday in Jos represent "an escalation" of the crisis, according Chidi Odinkalu, director of the Africa program of the Open Society Justice Initiative. Besides the attack, alleged members of the sect Boko Haram attacked three churches in the city of Maiduguri in the north.
So far, authorities have refrained from commenting on the perpetrators of these attacks. These inter-community tensions are likely to be even stronger with the approach of presidential elections scheduled for April. Ethnic groups in central Nigeria in the area of Jos, the Berom and other ethnic groups see themselves as the Christian communities in the region while Hausa and Fulani Muslims are viewed as "settlers" even if their presence in the center of the country back several decades.
The Hausa settled in the Plateau region to work in the tin industry, there are more than a century. The Fulani nomads arrived in the area to find pasture for their herds. Both ethnic groups are then mixed before starting a fight against the Berom for power and economic policy in the region.
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