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African press review 16 May 2014

The extension of emergency laws in Nigerian states facing Boko Haram insurgency dominates comments in the African press today.

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Nigeria’s House of Representatives unanimously passed a motion on Thursday approving President Goodluck Jonathan’s request for a six-month extension of the state of emergency enforced in three northern regions, Borno, Yobe and Adamawa, the hotbed of the Boko Haram insurgency and the frontline of their jihad to set up an Islamist state.

Punch reports that lawmakers Okayed the measure after a three-hour briefing by a security chief in Abuja on Thursday. According to the paper, the vast majority of house members wanted to send a powerful message to the military as they step up the hunt for over 200 school girls abducted by insurgents in Chibok on 14 April.

The Guardian underlines that northern leaders, gathered under the National Conference Committee on Security, voiced strong objection to the federal government’s extension of emergency rule in Adamawa, Borno, Yobe states, pointing out that such action would further bring more hardship to the people rather than crush insurgency.

The Sun says more than 60 insurgents were killed during clashes Wednesday night with Nigeria’s Joint Military Task Force in a terrorist hideout in Jigawa state. According to the paper, the army operation was launched after a bomb planted by the insurgents blew up an army pick-up killing three soldiers with several others sustaining serious injuries.

TheVanguard, meanwhile, reports that Jonathan is due to fly to Borno state today for a morale-boosting meeting with troops deployed in Chibok where the girls were kidnapped. The paper says the president will then fly from the state capital Maiduguri to Paris to attend Saturday’s security summit convened by French President François Hollande.

This Day says Jonathan will be joined at the summit by the leaders of Benin, Cameroon, Chad and Niger with officials from the United States, the EU and Britain and are expected to help work out an emergency plan to deal with the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria and other terror groups operating in west and central Africa.

Business Day and the Nation take up the frustrations expressed by a top US defence official over Nigeria’s slow response to the Boko Haram threat.

Alice Friend, the Pentagon’s principal director for African affairs, told the Senate’s Africa sub-committee on Thursday that Nigeria had failed to mount an effective campaign against the insurgents. But she reiterated Washington’s commitment to the ongoing fight against the group and the safe return of the girls.

In South Africa the Johannesburg Star posts a comment on the “Missing Girls and how Nigeria got there”. According to the paper, the agonising plight of the families of the more than 200 Nigerian girls kidnapped by Boko Haram and the Nigerian government’s dismal failure to protect them has evoked worldwide outrage and condemnation.

It points out that the official misuse of resources for personal enrichment has ranked Nigeria 139th out of 176 countries in Transparency International’s 2012 Corruption Perceptions Index with the police perceived to be one of the most corrupt institutions in the country.

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