Boko Haram insurgents on Thursday attacked the Army Special Super Camp at Ngamdu, a border town between Borno and Yobe states where the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Gen. Tukur Yusuf Buratai, has relocated, to launch a final onslaught on the terrorists.
The attack occurred barely 72 hours after Gen. Buratai sent a message to defeat the insurgents within a very short time.
The Nation reports that the COAS at the 2020 Special Easter Celebration with the troops at the camp, promised to stay with them until the insurgents are “substantially degraded”.
But the terrorists on Thursday tested their confidence by attacking the camp, as Gen. Buratai and his officers were mapping out strategies to execute his final blow on the insurgents.
Sources at the camp, who are not authorised to speak with the press, said that the insurgents came in motor gun trucks from the southwestern side of the camp and opened fire.
Other sources said that mortar guns were launched at the camp, but no fatality was recorded.
Some of the troops were said to have sustained minor injuries.
Our reporter learnt that Buratai ordered the troops to chase the insurgents away and warned them to focus on a bigger target.
“The Chief of Army Staff told the soldiers to see what happened as a distraction from the main operation they are going to carry out. But we defended ourselves very well by repelling them,” a source said.
Another source said that the insurgents could have been angered by an earlier advance operation the troops carried out yesterday.
“We suspect it was the advance operation we carried out yesterday that angered them and they decided to attack us. You know we killed some of their men in the operation and captured others, so they were angry,” the source said.