JournalistBAUCHI, Nigeria, (Islamweb & Agencies) -A Muslim journalist working for Agence France-Presse was forced out of a town in northern Nigeria under police protection early Wednesday after being menaced by a mob of Christian youths. (Read photo caption below)
Aminu Abubakar, a freelance correspondent for AFP based in the northern city of Kano, had gone to the town of Tafawa Balewa in Bauchi State on Tuesday to report on unrest.
Many dozens of people have been killed and thousands forced to flee their homes in ethnic and religious clashes between Muslims and Christians in the town since an incident last month, witnesses told Abubakar.
More were killed in four villages in the Bogoro local government area, reliable medical sources speaking on condition of anonymity said, pushing the estimated death toll into the hundreds.
When the correspondent was interviewing people in the town early Wednesday, a crowd of Christian youths gathered and became aggressive.
"Most of the Muslims have left Tafawa Balewa. The crowd said they had heard an AFP journalist who is a Muslim was interviewing people and wanted to attack me," Abubakar said.
"They threatened to kill me and I was only saved by the police," he said, explaining that a police unit formed a protective ring around him.
Abubakar said he was forced to publicly rip up the notebook which he had been using before the mob would allow him to leave, under police escort, for the state capital, Bauchi.
The youths were members of an ethnic-religious organisation known as the Zar Youth, whose members are Christians from the Sayawa ethnic community.
The Sayawa have been angered by the introduction last month across most of the state of the Islamic law code, known as the Sharia, favoured by Muslims.
In the days that followed June 19 many dozens of people were killed, mosques were burned, several churches attacked, dozens of homes burned down.
Hundreds of heavily armed police have been deployed to the town from five neighbouring states and were early Wednesday manning checkpoints on the streets and at the town gates.
Divisional police officer Abdul Gimba said the situation in the town was "still tense" early Wednesday.
"Tension is still high. These youths are hostile," he said.
PHOTO CAPTION:
After lurching from one military coup to another, Nigeria now has an elected leadership. But it faces the growing challenge of preventing Africa's most populous country from breaking apart along ethnic and religious lines. (BBC)