Nigerian Governor Says Army Ignored Massacre Warnings

Posted on Mar 9, 2010

AP / NTA TV

In this image taken from Nigerian TV, a crowd gathers on Sunday around the bodies of victims of interfaith violence in the town of Dogo Nahawa, Nigeria, about three miles south of the city of Jos.

On Sunday, hundreds of people were killed in three Nigerian villages near the city of Jos in a retaliatory massacre that might have been thwarted, according to a local governor, had the military paid attention to warning signs before it began and distress signals once it was under way.  —KA

BBC:

Governor Jonah Jang said he had warned the army about reports of suspicious people with weapons hours before they attacked, but they failed to take action.

“Three hours or so later, I was woken by call that they have started burning the village and people were been hacked to death,” he said.

“I tried to locate the commanders. I couldn’t get any of them on the telephone.”

The head of the northern area of Nigeria’s Christian Association said he believed mercenaries were involved.

Saidu Dogo told the BBC that fighters from neighbouring Chad and Niger took part in the violence.

“For quite some time we have alerted the government to training grounds in some part of the northern state where people are being trained to cause problems in the country… Nobody did anything about it,” he said.

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