- Nigeria’s apex bank lowers its benchmark lending rate to 8%.
- Police officer killed, four foreigners Kidnapped in Port Harcourt
- Boko Haram killed 4, including a 7 year-old girl in Yobe and Borno
- DSS accused a Biafra separatist group of killing 55 people found in shallow graves
According to Margaret MacMillan, we can learn from history, but we can also deceive ourselves when we selectively take evidence from the past to justify what we have already made up our minds to do.
The general consensus is that people who accept their prior successes, mistakes, and flaws rather than try to dismiss them are more likely to achieve in the future. In both good and bad times, we need to share our insights and think back. When we think back on these occasions, they remind us of the lowest point in our country’s history and bolster our resolve to win every time.
In an effort to respect the principles of history and bring historical events to the doorsteps of our esteemed readers, WITHIN NIGERIA highlighted three notable events that happened on April 9 in the history of this country, Nigeria.
Nigeria’s apex bank lowers its benchmark lending rate to 8%.
On this day, April 9 in 2009, Nigeria’s Central Bank cut its benchmark lending rate to 8% from 9.75%.
The apex bank also announced measures aimed at boosting liquidity in the market.
Police officer killed, four foreigners Kidnapped in Port Harcourt
On this day, April 9 in 2010, four expatriates, including three Syrians and a Lebanese working in the construction sector in Rivers State, were abducted by gunmen, while a policeman was killed in the attack.
This was made known on Friday by police spokeswoman Rita Abbey.
“About 10 or more kidnappers, all armed with automatic weapons, fired many rounds. The hoodlums kidnapped four expatriate workers, three Syrians and one Lebanese,” said Abbey.
Boko Haram killed 4, including a 7 year-old girl in Yobe and Borno
On this day, April 9 in 2012, gunmen suspected to be members of the radical Islamist sect, Boko Haram killed at least four people – including a 7-year-old girl – in recent attacks in Yobe state, army and police.
In the city of Potiskum, gunmen opened fire on a policeman and his family, killing the policeman’s 7-year-old daughter, the Police Public Relations officer of the Yobe State command, Toyin Gbadegeshin said.
“They fired shots at him while sitting in the midst of his family. He managed to avoid the bullets and scaled over the fence,” Mr Gbadigisin said.
“The gunmen shot dead his seven-year-old-daughter and seriously injured another 12-year-old daughter and a 10-year-old-son who are now in hospital.”
The police spokesman blamed Boko Haram, a group waging an increasingly bloody fight with the Nigerian security forces, for the attack.
DSS accused a Biafra separatist group of killing 55 people found in shallow graves
On this day, April 9 in 2016, Nigerian secret police accused a Biafra separatist group of killing 55 people after discovering their bodies in shallow graves in a thick forest in the country’s southeast.
The Department of State Service (DSS), Nigeria’s domestic spy agency, said the graves were found in Umuanyi forest in Abia state, home to the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) movement.
It issued a statemant late Saturday accusing IPOB members of playing a “heinous role” in the abduction of five Hausa-Fulani residents, although the claims were dismissed by another Biafran group.
“The abducted men were later discovered at the Umuanyi forest, Abia state, where they were suspected to have been killed by their abductors and buried in shallow graves, amidst 50 other shallow graves of unidentified persons,” spokesman Tony Opuiyo said in the statement.
“Arrests and investigation conducted so far revealed that elements within the IPOB carried out this dastardly action,” he said.
