Two female suicide bombers struck a market in the northeast Nigerian state of Adamawa yesterday, an army official said, with a local community leader giving a toll of at least 30 killed.
The military chief in Adamawa state, Brigadier-General Victor Ezugwu, confirmed the twin suicide blasts in the town of Madagali but did not give a toll.
Madagali sits close to the border of Boko Haram stronghold Borno state and has been repeatedly attacked by the jihadists in their quest to establish an independent Islamic State in Africa’s most populous nation.
“The two female bombers killed at least 30 people in the twin blasts in the market,” Maina Ularamu, a community leader and former chairman of Madagali local government, told AFP.  In August last year, Boko Haram seized Madagali, prompting an exodus of residents to the state capital of Yola.
Since then, the Nigerian military has clawed back Madagali in a series of military victories against the Islamist group, winning territory across Borno, Adawama and Yobe states.
In a defiant show of strength, Boko Haram rebels have staged a wave of attacks in the final days before Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari’s self-imposed deadline to exterminate the group expires on December 31.
Between Sunday and Monday morning the militants launched suicide and gun attacks on the key northeast city of Maiduguri in Borno state, killing 22 people and injuring scores of others.
Earlier this week, Buhari had said the Nigerian government had “technically” defeated Boko Haram and reduced their capacity to attack, yet the latest bloodshed the militants remain capable of causing mass carnage.