Boko Haram raids French-owned cement works in northern Nigeria

Fighters believed to be from Nigeria’s Boko Haram Islamist group raided a French-owned cement works in the north of the country after robbing a bank and killing at least 10 people on Tuesday.

Boko Haram leader Aboubakar Shekau in a video released by the group AFP

The plant in Ashaka, Gombe state, was functioning as normal on Wednesday morning after a group of armed men and women made off with dynamite and eight pick-up trucks in a raid whose aim appears to have been purely logistical.

"The factory was the target of intruders. There were no injuries. There was no damage in the factory," Lafarge boss Bruno Lafont told reporters in Paris on Wednesday. "This morning the situation is still calm and everything is back to normal."

The group attacked the plant at about 3.00pm on Tuesday after raiding a bank, blowing up a police station and destroying a political party’s office in Nafada, 20 kilometres away, killing five soldiers, four worshippers at a mosque and the imam in the process.

Most workers had fled the plant after hearing that they were heading in its direction.

Some of those who remained said that the raiders demanded to be taken to where expatriate managers are housed but did not kidnap or harm anyone.

Diplomats said that no French national were captured during the raid.

The Lafarge plant, which opened in 1974, employs 500 people and is the largest cement works in northern Nigeria.

The company refuses to say how many expatriates work there and will not give their nationalities.

Nafada is near the border with Yobe state, which has been under emergency rule since May 2013 and where Boko Haram is reported to control several towns and villages.