Security
HUMAN Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, a civil rights advocacy group, said the chief law enforcement officer of the Federation who is the inspector General of Police has a legal responsibility to inform Nigerians on the identities and numbers of suspected perpetrators of the mass murders on Christmas Eve of last year in Plateau State that have been charged to court even as the particulars of the charges should be publicised.
“We are concerned that the police and other security forces may simply fail to follow up and carry out evidence-based investigations to generate top-rated convincing and unimpeachable evidence to convict the killers who slaughtered Plateau State natives in their large numbers and thereby undermine the rule of law and provide escape routes for these terrorists to escape the long arm of the law and to continue to carry out their agenda of mass killings and genocide.
“The recent court order freeing 313 terrorists in Borno State by a federal High Court based on tardiness on the part of the prosecution team, has become the usual methodology of the nation’s law enforcement operators thereby undermining the constitution and letting mass killers to continue to enjoy freedom and probably carry out more attacks.”
HURIWA said the demand for public disclosure and accountability is informed by the scandalous contradictory media statements by the police since the dastardly criminal act of terrorism happened in well over 17 communities of Plateau State therefore creating doubts and uncertainty in the minds of Nigerians regarding what exactly the law enforcement agencies have done to apprehend the terrorists who carried out the killing of over 200 villagers who were preparing for the 2023 Christmas festivities in their communities.
It will be recalled that on the 10th January 2024, it was reported that the Nigeria Police Force Intelligence Department Tactical Teams, paraded 67 suspects arrested for various crimes, ranging from kidnapping, gunrunning, one-chance robbery, armed robbery, and banditry across the country.
Among the paraded suspects were three arrested in connection with the Christmas Eve attack on 15 Plateau State villages in which over 150 persons were killed and about 221 houses razed, leading to the displacement of over 10,000 residents.
The Force Public Relations Officer, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, identified the three suspects as Ahmed Sulaimon, Balikisu Aliyu and Aboki Samuel.
He said the police recovered from them one AK-47 rifle, one AK-49 rifle, 1,000 rounds of live ammunition and five magazines.
HURIWA recalled that again on January 25, 2024, it was reported that seventeen suspects were paraded by the police in connection with the recent killings in parts of Plateau State.
The suspects were paraded by the Assistant Inspector General of Police in charge of Zone 4, Ebong Eyibio, at the headquarters of the Plateau State Police Command in Jos.
Eyibio said eight of the suspects were arrested in connection with the 2023 Christmas Eve attacks, while the other nine were apprehended for their alleged involvement in the recent security breach in Mangu LGA of the state.
He also disclosed that ten corpses were recovered after the recent incident in Mangu.
Few days after the massive Christmas eve killings of Plateau state natives by suspected armed Fulani herders, then on December 27, 2023, the death toll in Nigeria’s Christmas Eve reportedly rose to 150, Plateau state officials claimed, while survivors and observers expressed outrage at the government’s reaction.
Plateau authorities say the gunmen overran more than 17 local villages across Bokkos and two other districts, burning down houses in the attack.
A local district head in Bokkos said search teams were still combing nearby bushes for missing people. Thousands have been displaced from their homes.
Shelong Gabriel said she last spoke to two of her male cousins on Christmas Eve.
She said that the two brothers — ages 45 and 58 — told her they had joined a local vigilante group because of a warning of a possible attack. Later that night, she said, assailants attacked the village, killing the men and their mother.
HURIWA said the clouds of uncertainty woven around the arrests and prosecution of alleged perpetrators of the mass murders on Christmas Eve in Plateau state even on Good Friday of year 2024, nearly three months after those terror attacks, is symptomatic of law enforcement mechanism that lacks transparency and accountability just as the Rights group said in the spirit of the freedom of information Act, the inspector General of Police should provide holistic clarification so Nigerians who are interested in following up can very well do so.
HURIWA warns that any attempt to hide the information on the suspected killers of Plateau natives on Christmas Eve would amount to impunity and lawlessness which Nigerians should absolute deprecate and reject and then insist that justice must be done to the victims and survivors of those coordinated and well planned mass killings of Plateau state natives by suspected armed Fulani militiamen.
“We will continue to present our public demand for accountability because letting these large-scale pogrom to slide and then the victims forgotten, would mean that Nigerians have lost the sense of collective national outrage against impunity. We appeal to Nigerians to defend the rule of law and to always speak out and hold government accountable.”
A.
-March 28, 2024 @ 13:53 GMT|
Tags: HURIWA
