By Okey
Ndibe
Except in extremely isolated cases — for example, as an act of
self-defense — it is morally indefensible for individuals to engage in
extra-judicial killing. When a government makes it its business to slaughter
unarmed citizens that government reveals itself as criminally thuggish and the
state in whose behalf that government kills loses its moral legitimacy.
That, I am afraid,
is the burden that President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration has placed on
itself.
Last week, Amnesty
International (AI), a human rights group, released a chilling report on the
Buhari administration’s excessively brutal response to members of the
Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) who have been agitating for the rebirth of Biafra . The AI report is a thorough job, based on
interviews of 193 people (most of them eyewitnesses), analysis of 87 videos and
122 photographs “showing IPOB assemblies, members of the security forces in the
process of committing violations and victims of these violations.” Much of the
60-page report is devoted to offering painstaking accounts of how Nigeria ’s
security agencies, including the military, killed, maimed, and tortured
pro-Biafra agitators.
For those who can’t
stomach much gore and horror, I would recommend AI’s executive summary, which
highlights the sad, sobering facts. That summary begins, “Since August 2015, the security forces have killed at least 150
members and supporters of the pro-Biafran organisation IPOB (Indigenous Peoples
of Biafra ) and injured hundreds during
non-violent meetings, marches and other gatherings. Hundreds were also arbitrarily
arrested.”
According to
Amnesty International, “Video footage and
eyewitness testimony consistently show that the military, which has been
deployed instead of police to control pro-Biafran events, has dispersed
peaceful gatherings by firing live ammunition with little or no warning. This
report documents extra-judicial executions and the use of excessive force by
military, police and other security agencies. It also shows a worrying pattern
of arbitrary arrests and detentions, including soldiers arresting wounded
victims in hospital, and of torture and other ill-treatment of detainees.”
As the head of the
Nigerian state, President Buhari bears ultimate responsibility for the carnage
committed by Nigeria ’s
security agents. He is not the first Nigerian ruler to oversee mindless mass
killing. Under former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Nigerian troops went on a
homicidal rampage in Odi, Bayelsa State , and Zaki Biam, in Benue State .
The late President Umaru Yar’Adua was in control when Nigerian soldiers swept
through Maiduguri and other cities in Borno State ,
killing hordes of men on mere suspicion that they belonged to the Islamist
group, Boko Haram.
President Buhari
has earned a place in the bloodlust. Under his watch, troops slashed and burned
their way through a Shiite neighbourhood near Zaria ,
Kaduna State . His inflexible stance on the
vexed issue of Biafra , marked by a dismissive
tone, has helped to create a violent climate. Perhaps encouraged by the
President’s hectoring style, heavily armed soldiers and other security
personnel have gleefully mowed down agitators who dared hoist up IPOB banners.