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Despite security measures deployed by the Borno State Police Command, some suspected Boko Haram gunmen have shot and killed a man, and left another seriously injured.

The Nigerian Compass gathered that the two gunmen, who arrived on a motorbike, had targeted the Bulama of Gwaidamgari Ward, behind Railway Terminus quarters in old Maiduguri, but, unfortunately, their victims were Ba’ Abdu, a kolanut trader and Abba Kale, a grain seller.

Abdu was shot dead while sitting in front of a mosque while the injured Kale, was shot in front of his shop at about 1p.m.

The state’s Commissioner of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Abdu, could not confirm the incident as he said he was yet to be briefed.

But an eyewitness revealed that people in the area saw the two persons who rode on a motorcycle before the attack, but could not identify either of them.

"The person behind had a gun in his hand. He was the one who shot the victims one after the other," said the eyewitness.

Narrating her ordeal to the Nigerian Compass, daughter to the deceased said that the family members were inside the house when all hell broke loose.

They later learnt from eyewitnesses that her father, Abdu, was sitting by the mosque, when someone shouted: "That is the Bulama (the ward head)," and then the gunmen fired in his direction. The trader fell down and died instantly.

It will be recalled that a bomb explosion was recorded in the area, located behind the headquarters of the Boko Haram sect, before July 2009 unrest.

Stop and search by security operatives and a ban on motorcycle operations from 6p.m to 7a.m had since been introduced to check activities of the sect and beef up security in the state.

Since the July and August attacks in Maiduguri and Bama, by suspected armed sect members, resulting in the death of six policemen and four civilians, including a ward head, leaving four others seriously injured, security has been heightened, with police and soldiers patrolling sensitive areas.

By Gbenga Akingbule, Maiduguri

Photo: Panairjdde

Hold your breath. You are about to witness some very severe historical penalties. Though our ancient cultures were said to be verycivilized, there is evidence of their having used a wide variety ofhideous torture methods throughout history to end the lives of criminalsand traitors.

10. Death by Boiling Photo: unknown

Can you imagine boiling someone alive in large pot? Though not common, this was an unusually cruel method of execution. There is plentyof evidence that it was practiced throughout human history.Archeologists have found human bones in cooking pots and hearths in China which were found to be around 500,000 years old.

In England in the 1500s this was the legal method of punishment. The victim was immersed in boiling water, oil or tar until dead. Imagine thefear the prisoner felt when they were taken to this deadly big pot tosuffer their horrible fate.

9. Crucifixion
Photo: Baptiste Marcel

Crucifixion was among the most gruesome and painful of ancient execution methods and was practiced from about the 6th century BC untilthe 4th century AD, mainly among the Seleucids, Carthaginians, Persiansand Romans. The condemned person was tied (or nailed) to a large woodencross and left to hang till dead. Their dead body was then left ondisplay as a warning. Sometimes, the victim was ordered to carry theirown crossbeam – which weighed about 75-125 pounds (35-60 kg) – on theirshoulders to the place of execution. Not only this, but to humiliatethem, they were ordered to be hung up naked.

There is evidence of a practice much like crucifixion having taken place during World War I and II. A punishment known as ‘Field PunishmentNumber One' was very similar – although it involved the victim beingflogged rather than executed. In the British Army, especially duringWorld War I, soldiers were punished for crimes such as refusal of ordersand disobedience.

Nowadays, versions of crucifixion are practiced as a devotional ceremony in some part of New Mexico and the Philippines. Though thechurch greatly discourages this practice, followers of Jesus stillimitate the suffering of Christ by being 'crucified' for a limited timeon Good Friday. It has been seen in the town of Iztapalapa, just outsideMexico City, and also in San Pedro Cutud, during the ‘Passion WeekCelebration’ of 2007.

8. Flaying
Photo: Michelangelo Buonarroti

In this author's opinion, this was the most uncivilized method of torture and punishment practiced during the Middle Ages. Brutal to thebone, it involved removing the skin from the body of a still livingprisoner.

Flaying was an ancient practice, inflicted on criminals, captured soldiers and 'witches' around a thousand years ago in places such as theMiddle East and Africa. The victim was flayed alive as part of a publicexecution, after which the skin was nailed to the wall as a warning, sothat others would heed the lesson and never ever dare to defy the law...........

7. Disembowelment
Photo: Kunikazu Utagawa

Disembowelment was among the most severe forms of punishments ever heard of or seen. This method was used to punish thieves and thoseaccused of adultery. Some or all the vital organs were removed one byone from the body, mainly from the abdomen. Sources say it was practicedin England, the Netherlands, Belgium and in Japan.

In Japan, it was a ritualized suicide method for Samurai, referred as “seppuku”, in which two cuts across the abdomen were made. In anotherversion, a fine cut was made in the victim’s gut, leaving him to ca

In the fourth of a series of articles looking at policing in Nigeria, the BBC's Andrew Walker asks what happened to the "Apo Six", the most infamous case of extra-judicial killing in Nigeria's history:

The pictures are truly gruesome - we cannot publish them.

Lawyer Amobi Nzelu spreads the glossy prints out on his desk, covering it with horror.

There is nowhere else to look except at the bodies.

There is a close-up of a face, gaping exit-wound at the temple.

Limbs and torsos covered in blood.

Dead eyes stare upward.

"This is a human being," he says.

"Look what they did."

Apology

The bodies belong to six young Nigerians killed by the police.

Ekene Isaac Mgbe, Ifeanyin Ozor, Chinedu Meniru, Paulinus Ogbonna and Anthony and Augustina Arebu were killed on 7 and 8 June, 2005.

My friend was going to the bush, to go to the toilet, when he saw the police digging a hole and preparing to bury some people Elvis Ozor Younger brother of Ifeanyin

The police tried to say they were armed robbers who had opened fire first.

But a judicial panel of inquiry set up by former President Olusegun Obasanjo rejected the police's story and the government apologised on behalf of the police for their killings.

The government paid $20,300 (£13,800) compensation to each of the families.

It recommended the officers be arrested and face a criminal trial.

But nearly four years since the night the Apo Six were killed, the trial has got nowhere.

The public has almost forgotten the case is still going on.

Danjuma Ibrahim, the senior police officer accused of ordering the killings, lives free on medical bail.

And the families of the dead have all but given up on justice.

Tight-knit

Elvis Ozor is the younger brother of Ifeanyin Ozor.

Like his brother, he works as a spare car parts merchant in the Apo mechanics' village, south of the capital, Abuja.

It is a kind of shanty-town of sea crates and workshops where five of the Apo Six worked.

This is a tight-knit community, mostly of ethnic Igbos from Nigeria's south-east.

On 8 June 2005 the Apo mechanics found the police burying their friends in a cemetery that, by chance, was near their workshops.

"My friend was going to the bush, to go to the toilet, when he saw the police digging a hole and preparing to bury some people," Elvis says.

"They recognised my brother. When the police said they were armed robbers, no-one believed them - they knew my brother was not like that."

"When I arrived at work, word had spread, but I didn't know. I arrived and everyone was looking at me," he says.

The story was out, and an angry mob gathered.

There was a riot in Apo and the police shot two more people dead.

Unlike any other case of suspected extra-judicial killing in Nigeria, some of the police broke ranks and turned on the senior officer involved.

The other five officers accused of the murders and eight more police witnesses have testified that Danjuma Ibrahim ordered the killings.

During the judicial panel hearings, some Igbo police officers fed information to Mr Nzelu, who represented the families of the Apo Six.

The panel heard that the six were at a nightclub in Abuja's Area 11 when Mr Ibrahim - then off duty - propositioned Augustina.

She turned him down, according to the testimony of Ifeanyin Ozor's friends.

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