A Non-Governmental Organisation, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has threatened to drag President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo before the International Criminal Court (ICC) over herdsmen’s killings across the country.
HURIWA also lambasted the Osibanjo-led committee on the herdsmen killings for recommending dialogue with Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders of Nigeria.
The group said it would amount to a treasonable felony to dialogue with alleged sponsors of the mass killings allegedly perpetrated by armed Fulani herdsmen.
The rights group said: “What a sane administration in a properly administered constitutional democracy ought to do is to enforce the relevant laws by arresting, prosecuting and legally sanctioning the leadership of Miyetti Allah cattle owners’ association who were clearly seen addressing media conferences and threatening fire and brimstone just few days before each of the deadly attacks targeting farming communities which escalated in the last three years.”
The rights group said it had instructed its legal team to file additional material evidences to the ICC in The Hague, Netherlands to reinforce an earlier petition it sent to the same global crimes court on the incessant Fulani herdsmen’s terrorism all over Nigeria with the renewed mandate to list Osinbanjo and his committee dialoguing with Miyetti Allah as defendants.
In a media statement, HURIWA’s National coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and its National Media Affairs Director, Miss Zainab Yusuf carpeted the Presidency for persistently deploying armed security forces only after innocent Nigerians were massacred by armed Fulani marauders.
HURIWA criticised the Directorate of Public Relations at the Nigerian Defence Headquarters “for insisting that it wouldn’t deploy soldiers to protect farmers coming under attacks from armed Fulani herdsmen, but only to hurriedly despatch military troops soon after the dastardly criminal act of mob killing of seven suspected Hausa/Fulani travellers by some unruly mob in Gboko, Benue State as if the military of Nigeria has become the official Hausa/Fulani police under President Muhammadu Buhari.”
HURIWA warned the Buhari administration to stop stoking the fire of mutual suspicions through its preferences for nepotism in appointments of strategic security chiefs and favouritism in the selective deployment of armed soldiers only to chase after cattle rustlers and to protect Hausa/Fulani herdsmen from possible reprisals after every violent attacks of farming communities by armed Fulani herdsmen.
“May we remind President Muhammadu Buhari of the time tested facts that the ongoing executive lawlessness which has made most other communities outside of Hausa/Fulani to live in fear will precipitate a long drawn out civil unrest in the nearest future unless the government addressed the lopsided appointments of defence chiefs, which favours Hausa/Fulani and balance the composition to have semblance of federal character in line with extant constitutional provisions.
“Impunity truly makes key government officials who constitute the cabal in the Presidency to commit lawless activities such as condoning armed Fulani attacks because they share ethno-religious affiliations with the armed Fulani herdsmen and these criminal act of impunity is being carried out because these officials feel protected by Buhari.
“Let the President be reminded that his discriminatory policies in matters of national security is a danger to the continuous existence of Nigeria.
“The heightened manifestations of abuse of power by Buhari and his officials, the oppressive deployment of soldiers to crush the Indigenous People of Biafra, the decimination of the mechanisms of Rule of Law and above all, the twin evil of the applications of tribalism and nepotism in national security affairs are grave threats to national peace and inter-ethnic harmony.”
The group condemned the President “for abysmally failing to discharge his primary constitutional duty, which is to provide security to all Nigerians irrespective of ethnicity or religious persuasions and also for adopting discriminatory policies both in appointment of heads of security forces in a pattern that shows clear biases against other ethno-religious communities outside of his Hausa/Fulani cleavages.
“The decision by the presidency to set up the Prof. Osinbanjo-led committee on the incessant armed Fulani attacks amounts to grave compromise of Nigeria’s national security interest. Why handle the grave security threats posed by armed Fulani terrorists like a village engagements when there are laws against mass murders? This amounts to desecration of our constitution.”
HURIWA also condemned the refusal of the National Assembly to employ the constitutional powers of impeachment against President Buhari, who, in its view, not only flagrantly violated the federal character principle in appointments of heads of national security team, but is now holding dialogue sessions with alleged sponsors of genocide which undermines constitutional democracy.