Second wave: Boko Haram attacks northeast Nigeria’s main city again

Boko Haram insurgents attacked the outskirts of Maiduguri in northeast Nigeria on Sunday, their second assault in a week on a city they hope to make the capital of a breakaway Islamist state. At least eight people were killed as the insurgents fought gunbattles with government soldiers. The insurgents, who arrived in several armed pick-up trucks and on motorbikes, attacked three points in the southwest and southeast at around the same time, a security source said. Troops backed by vigilantes had pushed them out of the southeast, a spokesman for a local pro-government vigilante group said.

There is heavy gunfire going on. Everybody is panicking and trying to flee the area.

Idris Abubakar, a resident of Polo on the southwestern outskirts of the city

In a separate incident in the town of Potiskum, 230 km west of Maiduguri, a suicide bomber blew himself up outside the house of a federal legislator, killing 10 people, two security sources told Reuters. Sabo Garbu, a member of the house of representatives, was unhurt. Growing violence by the insurgents is a big problem for President Goodluck Jonathan, who faces a presidential election on Feb. 14 that analysts say is too close to call. The electoral commission is struggling with logistics to enable more than a million internal refugees to vote.

Boko Haram Africa