Nigeria Police Say 15 Killed İn 2Nd Kaduna Blast

Nigerian police on Wednesday confirmed that at least 15 people had been killed in the day's second blast in the northwestern Kaduna State.



Police spokesman Aminu Lawan told Anadolu Agency that the blast, which hit a bus stop in the Kawo area, came barely two hours after a suicide bombing killed 25 people near the Mando area's Murtala Square.



The first blast had targeted popular Muslim Sufi scholar Dahiru Bauchi, while the second had barely missed Muhammadu Buhari, a prominent Nigerian opposition figure, Lawan noted.



The police spokesman said both bombings were being investigated, while Kaduna State Governor Ramalan Yero had declared a 24-hour curfew in the state capital.



Rawan condemned the attack as "cowardly," urging local residents to unite against "acts of terror."



Buhari, a retired army general and co-founder of the opposition All Progressive Congress (APC), is a likely contender in next year's presidential polls.



Bauchi, a Muslim scholar affiliated with the Tijanniyah Sufi order, is a fierce critic of Nigeria's Boko Haram militant group, the activities of which he has repeatedly dismissed as anti-Islamic.



No group has thus far claimed responsibility for Wednesday's twin bombings.



Kaduna State has witnessed a spate of recent attacks, which the authorities blame on longstanding ethnic and political rivalries and land disputes between farmers and herdsmen.



By Rafiu Ajakaye



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