The Federal Government and IPOB

LAST week, a sizeable crop of Igbo supporters of Biafran agitators marked what they called the Biafra Day. Some carried placards reading “Biafra” as though Biafra were a sovereign state within the framework of Nigeria. In the opinion of the Police and the Nigeria Army, such a protest with protesters carrying banners with the inscriptions of Biafra on them “constituted a crime against the Nigerian State” and reckoned that such protesters must be dealt with. In the event, both the police and the Armed Forces killed scores of Igbo campaigners for a people’s republic of Biafra.

To our mind, such killings were illegal, uncalled for and, therefore, regrettable. First, the police have no right to kill unarmed demonstrators or protesters because, according to one of them, “they were committing a crime against Nigeria.” Nigerians are tired of listening to the police with their usual allegation that “the people carried dangerous weapons and killed or wanted to kill us”, then exhibit purposefully-stored arms and ammunition to prove their case.

The guilt of treasonable felony as contained in section 37 of the Criminal Code Act attracts the sentence of death, but the guilt and sentence of a treasonable felon must be pronounced by a duly constituted court of law, not the police. Secondly, the involvement of the Nigerian Army in the wanton killings beats our imagination. The role of the military is clearly spelt out in section 217 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended). It is, in the main, to defend Nigeria against external aggression and to maintain the territorial integrity of Nigeria or, where called upon by the President, to suppress insurrection and act in aid of civil authorities to restore order, subject to the Presidential order and manner of intervention by the military being approved by the National Assembly.

So, how did the military, trained, not to maim but to kill, get involved in the IPOB demonstrations? On the orders of the President? If trusted and reliable Boko Haramites show up today for a dialogue with the Federal Government, the latter would jump at the offer for a dialogue with them. Why, we dare ask, is the same Federal Government unwilling to dialogue with IPOB or the Niger Delta militants? Our late President Umaru Musa Yar A’dua tried it and succeeded; former President Ebele Jonathan followed his boss’s footsteps and succeeded as well. Why has this government, like Obasanjo’s government before it, chosen to apply the stick without the carrot?

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Between 1999 and 2001, the Obasanjo administration had killed scores of able-bodied men and women in Rivers and Benue States. What has just happened in the South East is a sad re-enactment of Odi and Zaki Biam massacres. And it is painful. Every time the Scots in the United Kingdom, for instance, demanded home rule, sometimes violently, it was never reported that someone lost his life. Some time, last year, the civilized government of Great Britain, which values human life, organized a referendum, in accordance with International Law, in which referendum the protagonists of home rule for Scotland were roundly defeated. And that, for now, is the end of agitations for home rule. Same thing has happed in Québec, Canada. Why do Nigerian governments luxuriate in killing us?

According to Article 1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (an arm of the UN) provides: “All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” This provision is repeated ipsissimis verbis in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966).

“We the peoples of the United Nations Determined to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.” That is the preamble of the United Nations Charter of which Nigeria has been a signatory since 1960.

The Senate is being called upon to look at whys and wherefores of the killings in the South East, but we suggest the Federal Government should set up a judicial Commission of Inquiry to probe the killings. Where overzealous policeman or soldiers are identified, they should be promptly charged for murder.