Nigeria military: Sect member at senator's home

Nigeria's military arrested a member of the radical Islamist sect Boko Haram at the home of a prominent senator, as ongoing violence blamed on the sect in a nearby city has killed at least 23 people in recent days, officials said.                  

Shuaibu Muhammed Bama had been found "in a serving senator's home" in Maiduguri on Thursday night, military spokesman Lt. Col. Sagir Musa said. Musa described Bama as a commander who organized attacks in Bama, a town just southeast of Maiduguri in Borno state.                  

Those living in Nigeria's Muslim north often take the name of their town or village as a surname. He also is not the first to join Boko Haram from that town. Authorities blamed a Christmas Day car bombing of a Catholic church outside Nigeria's capital that killed at least 44 people on Habibu Bama, a former soldier from the town. Security forces killed Habibu Bama in June, the sect has said.                 

Potiskum, a city 140 miles (230 kilometers) west of Maiduguri, has seen increasingly violent attacks carried out by Boko Haram in the last six months. On Saturday, the burned-out remains of schools still smoldered in the city, razed after attacks locals blamed on the sect.                     

Boko Haram, which speaks to local journalists in telephone conference calls at times of its choosing, could not be immediately reached for comment Saturday.                              

The killings in Potiskum continued Saturday, as witnesses said gunmen raided the Potiskum home of a former Nigeria Customs Service official and killed him and his son.


AP