Butchery Across The Niger: How Jubilant IPOB/Pro
Biafra Activists Were Shot, Abducted, Murdered & Dumped At Onitsha
Government General Hospital By Soldiers Of Onitsha Military Cantonment (1)
(Onitsha Nigeria, 5th of April 2016)-Following intensification of falsehood, propaganda and evidence
destruction by leaderships of the Nigerian Army and the Nigeria Police Force
under statutorily retired but cabalistically retained Lt General Turkur Buratai
and retiring IGP Solomon Arase respectively; over mass shooting, maiming and
killing of dozens of unarmed, non violent and innocent IPOB/pro Biafra
activists and their supporters across the Southeast of Nigeria as ordered by the duo recently, the leadership of International Society for Civil
Liberties & the Rule of Law (Intersociety) has resolved again to bring
to the attention of all Nigerians and members of the international community
including all international rights and media groups the irrefutable, un-concocted
and shocking evidence of how jubilant and unarmed IPOB/pro Biafra
activists, in their dozens, were shot at
close range, maimed, abducted, murdered and dumped at the Anambra State
Government owned Onitsha General Hospital by soldiers of the Onitsha Military
Cantonment, headed by Col Issah Abdullahi.
As a research
and grassroots oriented rights organization in Nigeria, located at the heart of
the Niger and Southeast of the country, we are appalled and saddened at all
times reading and listening to lies or falsehoods of intensified magnitude dish
out on daily basis by the military and the police authorities in the country as
reasons for their actions or omissions to act in the dastardly act. The worst
of it all is that the present Federal Government of Nigeria’s official policy
is quadrupled into: repression, violence, falsehood and propaganda. It already
appears that the federally ruling party’s propaganda czar; Mr. Lai Mohammed,
has exhausted stockpiles of lies or falsehood and propaganda in his party’s
information warfare and warehouse and
ordered for more containers-load from the Middle East and other troubled Africa
countries and failed States.
The likes of
retiring IGP Solomon Arase and his army counterpart, have lied over their
ignoble roles in the dastardly act, to the extent of getting exhausted in the
business of lying. The retiring IGP appears to have given up to lying and
resort to reckless issuance of threats to use mass violence against unarmed and
defenseless Nigerians. Some Say that he
has now resorted to unholy exit strategy for the futile purpose of circumventing
his gloomy post retirement life within and outside the country, following
speedy and steady ticking of his exit clock. The Buratai led army authorities,
on their part, now go on rampage in evidence destruction and remedial
makeshifts including use of psychological violence, physical intimidation,
material evidence destruction, unfounded and trumped up accusation, arbitrary
arrest and illegal detention, image laundering through hiring or partnership
with conformist civil society groups, warped excuses and justifications of
their grievous rights abuses and establishment of fire brigade approach,
called-civil-military relation or human rights desk, all geared toward
escaping culpability particularly in the eyes of international law and
humanitarian principles etc. As we speak, for instance, no reasonable
person can say for certainty whether maimed, battered, lacerated and detained
Nigerian Shiite Muslim leader, Sheik Ibrahim Zaky El-Zaky, is still alive or
dead following his over 90 days of solitary incarceration in the hands of
coercive agencies of the Federal Government of Nigeria.
Nigeria As A Rogue State Party Under International
Law & UN System: Nigeria’s international
obligations are speedily and steadily endangered or threatened. This is because
its conducts under discussion are fundamentally affront to the Purposes
and Principles of the United Nations; defined in Articles 1 and 2 of
the UN Establishment Charter of 1945 as: “the maintenance of international peace and
security; respect for the equal rights and self determination of the peoples;
international cooperation in economic, social, cultural and humanitarian
matters, and the promotion of human rights for all without distinction”.
Failure or omission to adhere to these purposes and principles of the UN by any
member-State particularly the Federal Government of Nigeria is inexcusable and
considered a serious threat to international peace and security.
According to
Professor Thomas Hobbes, “the sovereignty of a State is no longer
absolute. It is now challenged and kept live in the ability of the State to
provide for the general wellbeing of her citizens (i.e. security and welfare)”.
This is now commonly called “sovereignty as a responsibility or citizens’
sovereignty”. The State of Nigeria as presently constituted is steadily failing
to live up to these expectations and sacred responsibilities. Turning State’s guns
against its unarmed and nonviolent citizens are inexcusable crimes against
humanity and a fundamental breach to the purposes and principles of the United
Nations as well as the basic standards of the international law and
humanitarian principles. Crimes
Against Humanity are expressly and unambiguously defined by the UN and
the International Criminal Law as “murder, extermination, enslavement,
deportation and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population,
before or during the war, or persecutions on political, racial or religious
grounds in the execution of or in connection with any crime within the
jurisdiction of the UN or any of its recognized criminal courts, whether or not
in violation of domestic laws of the country where perpetrated”.
Under the International
Law & the Humanitarian Principles, Nigeria as a member of the UN is
mandatorily obligated to adhere strictly to the ten basic or fundamental
standards of its International Law and Humanitarian Principles, which
are as follows: (1) everyone is or shall be entitled to equal protection of the law and
protection from violence and threats and member-State shall ensure this; (2)
member-State shall treat all victims of crime with compassion and respect and
ensure protection of their safety and privacy; (3) member-State shall not use
force on its citizens except when strictly necessary and proportionally and
minimally necessitated; (4) member-State shall avoid use of force when policing
unlawful but nonviolent assemblies; (5) member-State shall not use force except
strictly for self defense and protection of others (i.e. handling riots and
violent mob actions); (6) member-State
shall arrest nobody unless there are legal grounds to do so and ensure it is
done in line with lawful procedures; (7) member-State shall ensure that all
detainees have access promptly after their arrest to their families, lawyers and medical assistance; (8)
member-State shall ensure that all detainees are treated humanely; and further
ensure that it does not instigate or inflict torture or tolerate any act of
torture or ill treatment and its coercive agents holding detainees must refuse
to obey any order to inflict torture on their detainees.
Others are: (9)
Coercive agents of member-State concerned must not carry out order or cover up
extra judicial executions or disappearances and refuse any order to do so; and
(10) such concerned coercive agents of the member-State shall report all
breaches of those basic standards to their superior officers and to the office
of the Public Prosecutor and ensure they are fully investigated”.
We
invite all Nigerians and members of the international community to compare and
contrast these international provisions willingly acceded to by Nigeria as a
member of the United Nations and the dastardly act of opening fire, maiming and
massacre of dozens of unarmed and nonviolent Nigerians in the streets and
perimeter fenced school grounds.
Our questions to
Lt Generals Turkur Buratai and Gabriel Olanisakin; and retiring IGP Solom Arase
and their culpable sub commanders and subordinates are: Does opening of fire and
massacring of dozens of jubilant IPOB/pro Biafra activists singing and dancing
at the Onitsha Niger Bridgehead over court ordered release of their leader
amount to armed rebellion or mass violence and wanton destruction of public
properties warranting deployment of crude State violence? How, too, does
opening of fire and massacring of dozens of unarmed and nonviolent IPOB/pro
Biafra activists assembled peacefully at a public secondary school field with
perimeter fencing for the purpose of praying for the release of their leader
(Nnamdi Kanu-POC)amount to armed rebellion or mass violence or insurrection
warranting the unleashing of crude State violence?
Breaches of the basic
standards of the International Law and Humanitarian Principles and the Purposes
and Principles of the United Nations by any member-State are considered
by the UN and its Security Council as a serious threat to international peace
and security and such breaches attract against such errant member-State
coercive or non coercive humanitarian interventions and
severe consequences. The United Nations had also in 1996 expanded “threats to
international peace and security” to include “(1) extreme or complex humanitarian
emergencies occasioned by gross human rights abuses by State or non State
actors; (2) internal violence or armed conflict; and (3) disruption of
democracy”.
This was in
response to explosion, after the cold war, of intra-State violent conflicts and
reckless abandon with which State actors particularly in Africa, internally
suppress and massacre hundreds of thousands of their unarmed and innocent
nationals or non combatants mostly in peace times in pursuance of repressive
and discriminatory State policies particularly personal and structural violence
based on prohibitive and annihilative social, economic and cultural policies.
With these innovative changes at the international community, the
absolutist State sovereignty was tamed and made flexible and era of
impunity for regime crimes trounced.
The detailed
analysis above is to educate the likes of Lt Gen Turkur Buratai and retiring
IGP Solomon Arase that immunity within borders is not
timeless and immunity across the borders has no place in the lexicon of
international community. They can tell all the lies on earth while hanging on
their uniforms but once their uniform immunities (if any) elapse,
the international law as it is and as it ought to be shall command them to
account for their actions and conducts while in office. The fate of Charles
Taylor and Laurent Gbagbo send clear
messages to other regime criminals that there is no hiding place for them.
We had earlier
reported, grounded in facts and figures that the leaderships of the Nigerian
Army and the Nigeria Police Force under Lt Gen Turkur Buratai and IGP Solomon
Arase had between August 2015 and 9th of February 2016 jointly
opened fire at close range on unarmed and non violent IPOB/pro Biafra activists,
leading to the instant killing of over 80 of them and maiming of over 170 others.
Hundreds of them have also been arrested across the country by the Nigeria
Police Force and arraigned with unfounded, politically motivated and ill
conceived felonies carrying as much as death penalty and life imprisonment on
judicial conviction commonly under kangaroo circumstances.
The two senior
security heads’ culpabilities stem from their widely published operational
statements authorizing their sub commanders and subordinates to “use maximum
force and other means available” to respond to nonviolent and peaceful
processions, matches, prayers and street protests embarked upon by millions of
IPOB/pro Biafra activists and their supporters across the Southeast and the South-south
Nigeria. Each time their murderous orders are carried out by their
subordinates, they storm public arenas and announce rewards for such “gallant”
officers. Such rewards include promotions and other in-kind gifts or
recognitions. They are also individually culpable on account of their refusal
or omission to act to bring perpetrators to book; in other words, they also aid
and abet.
In the second part of this
statement, we shall furnish all Nigerians and members of the international
community including all the international rights and media groups the detailed
statistics concerning the Butchery Across the Niger
perpetrated by soldiers of the Onitsha Military Cantonment, commanded by Col
Issah Abdullahi, under the chief security watch of the Government of Anambra
State led by Mr. Willie Obiano. In the
entire shooting, maiming and killing, five locations are associated with those
shot and maimed. They are (1) Onitsha, (2) Asaba, (3) Enugu, (4) Aba and (5)
Igweocha (in Rivers State). Three locations, on the other hand, are associated
with shooting and killing. They are (1) Onitsha (1 &2), (2) Aba (1, 2 &
3) and (3) Igweocha (Rivers State).
Signed:
For: International Society for Civil
Liberties & the Rule of Law (Intersociety)
Emeka Umeagbalasi, Board Chairman
Mobile Line: +2348174090052
Obianuju Joy Igboeli, Esq.
Head, Civil Liberties & Rule of Law
Program
Mobile Line: +2348034186332
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