Troops, Boko Haram in highway battle

By Duku Joel, Damaturu Soldiers and Boko Haram insurgents engaged in a gun battle along the Maiduguri-Damaturu highway in Borno State in the early hours of yesterday.There were however two different accounts of the incident.While one account claimed that the gun duel began when the Boko Haram attempted to seize a military base at Lawan-Mainari village along the highway, a military source said the insurgents tried to sack the soldiers from their checkpoint along the road by laying an ambush for them.Lawan-Mainari is a village about two kilometres away from Jakana. Jakan, a town that is about 41 kilometres from Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, has been attacked several times by Boko Haram in the last 10 yearsThe spokesman of Sector II Operation Lafiya Dole, Lt. Kennedy Anyanwu, did not respond to calls by The Nation, but Borno State Commander of the Rapid Response Squad (RRS), Abioye Babalola, confirmed the incident. He, however, made no mention of casualties on both sides.Babalola said: It was an attack on the military at a location between Jakana and Mainok. The military effectively repelled the attack and reopened the road for commuters.But we had to provide an escort that followed trapped travellers down to Damaturu, to avoid any likelihood of the terrorists returning to attack innocent travellers.But a military source said: Soldiers left to mount the check-point between Jakana and Mainok but unknown to them, Boko Haram had already laid an ambush for them to arrive.They engaged them immediately in exchange of fire. We lost one officer who was a Lieutenant and two soldiers.Some Boko Haram insurgents were also killed but you know they will always carry their dead ones but our guys captured one alive and recovered one of their dead bodies.A local security source said that the insurgents came out three times (around 7.30 am, 9-10 am and 12noon or 1 pm) from the bush during the gun battle.Another local security source in Jakana, Bukar Adam, also said the soldiers halted movement on the highway to avoid civilian casualties.Adam added:The Boko Haram gunmen came out through the Lawan-Mainari axis of the highway to probably attack the military base there. They engaged one another in a shootout for some hours.
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