•Alleges adoption of ‘jungle justice, ethnic profiling’ by security agencies

By TINA TIMOTHY

The International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) has accused the Nigeria Police and other security forces for stigmatizing and labeling defenseless citizens in the eastern part of the country as ESN, IPOB or unknown gunmen and granting jihadist terrorists in the core north presidential protection and amnesty.

Intersociety, in a press statement in Onitsha, Eastern Nigeria on Sunday, October 2, 2022, signed by its principal officers Emeka Umeagbalasi, Chinwe Umeche Esquire and Chidinma Udegbunam Esquire, also accused the security forces of “fully adopting jungle justice, ethnic profiling and rewarding perpetrators of conduct atrocities with promotions and postings as operational codes”.

The statement reads: “Verified statistics gathered by Intersociety have shown clearly that the top hierarchies of the Nigeria Police Force, Military, Secret Police and other security agencies have adopted jungle justice, ethnic profiling (on the grounds of tribe and religion) and rewarding service perpetrators of the conduct atrocities with promotions and juicy postings as their operational codes. These have particularly and discriminatorily been the case in places like Imo, Ebonyi, Anambra, Abia, Enugu, Delta, Rivers, Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Benue, Plateau, Taraba, Adamawa and (Southern) Kaduna States where service conduct atrocities including service subversive conspiracies, abductions, enforced disappearances, extrajudicial executions and other unlawful killings; torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, etc, have been concentrated since the last quarter of 2015. In Eastern Nigeria States of Anambra, Abia, Akwa Ibom, Ebonyi, Enugu and Rivers, massive burning or destruction of civilian dwelling houses and other lawful properties have become a commonplace.

“In the whole, the top hierarchies of the deployed security agencies especially Police, Army and Secret Police have continued to engage in unchecked supervision and authorization of service conduct atrocities perpetrated by their subordinates with utter or mindless alacrity. These they have been unleashing on members of defenseless civilian population in the East by discriminatorily profiling, stigmatizing and falsely labeling them; resulting in enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detention and custodial torture and deaths including open or secret unlawful execution and other unlawful killings; all fueled by falsely labeling and stigmatizing the defenseless Eastern citizens as “ESN/IPOB members or Unknown Gunmen”. Reverse is the case in the core North where jihadist terrorists responsible for massacre of thousands of defenseless Christians and disproportionate moderate Muslims on yearly basis are being presidentially protected and amnestied.”

The group also lamented that local, regional and international legal frameworks have been grossly breached by the Nigerian security forces’ top hierarchies, particularly regarding their activities in the Eastern part of the country.

“The top hierarchies of the Nigeria Police Force and other security agencies especially the Army and Secret Police have abandoned due process of law and mindlessly resorted to gross breach of available legal frameworks moderating or guiding policing and law enforcement particularly in Eastern part of Nigeria. The available legal frameworks reprehensibly in gross breach are those with local, regional and international contents and legal, moral and operational binding effects on Nigeria as a State Party; including the UN Declaration on Human Rights, the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the UN Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights, United Nations Conventions on Women and Children’s Rights and UN Conventions against Genocide, Torture and Enforced Disappearances. Others are the UN Body of Principles for Protection of All Persons under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment, the UN Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions and UN Principles or Protocols or Codes of Conducts for Law Enforcement Officers; on Use of Force and Arms by Law Enforcement Personnel; and Use of Force and Proportionality of Force by Law Enforcement Agents, etc. The Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution and its auxiliary Access to Criminal Justice Act of 2015, among others, also provided sufficient local legal frameworks or safeguards to guide policing and law enforcement operations in Nigeria or any part thereof including Eastern Nigeria. These are sufficiently provided in the Chapter Four of the 1999 Constitution including Sections 33, 34, 35, 36 and so on,” it further stated.

Intersociety also decried “wanton destruction of civilian lives and properties in the East fueled by jungle justice” adding that “torture, extrajudicial killings and high bail fees have replaced court trial of detained citizens.”

The statement continues: “Militarization of routine police functions and failed detective and investigative policing in the Nigeria Police Force and its Bureaus of Intelligence and Investigations fueled by ethnic and religious policing and law enforcement have been widely responsible for incessancy of wanton destruction of lives and properties of members of defenseless civilian population in Eastern Nigeria which have been the case since last quarter of 2015; resulting in killing of several thousands of defenseless citizens and abduction and disappearance of several hundreds, if not thousands of others. The number of civilian’ buildings and other lawful properties burned or destroyed beyond recognition by the Nigerian security personnel are also in several thousands. In three years of 2020, 2021 and 2022, the number of unarmed citizens arrested or abducted by the Army, Police Special Squads and Secret Police in the East have been credibly and factually estimated at over 7000, with 4800 arrested from Oct 2020 to June 2022 alone.

“Our recent findings showed that the police and secret police authorities have substantially abandoned Court trial of the arrested and detained citizens-mostly members of defenseless civilian population in the East. This is even as Nigerian Army, lacking civil prosecutorial powers has continued to hold its civilian abductees in secret dudgeons with several cases of secret killings and abductions. South-East States of Imo, Abia, Ebonyi, Anambra and Enugu as well as South-South States of Rivers, Delta, Cross River and Akwa Ibom have emerged the most arrested and detained falsely accused and defenseless citizens’ States in Nigeria whereby out of every ten citizens arrested and detained, nine are most likely to be innocent, unarmed and defenseless. The named Eastern States have also independently been found to have topped the list of the States’ index with longest period of detention of the falsely accused/defenseless citizens in Nigeria-also the most lucrative source of police and policing extortions in the country. The authorities of the Nigeria Police Force and Secret Police have extensively jettisoned putting their long period detainees on fair and credible trials and resorted to torturing or starving them to death in custody or subjecting them to outright extrajudicial executions at ungodly hours. These are only substituted by astronomical unlawful bail fees whereby as low as N500, 000 to N1.5m and as high as N2m-N3m or more is placed on the head of every detainee controversially arrested and labeled “IPOB/ESN member/Unknown Gunman”. Imo State has continued to lead other States in the East as a State with the most congested security custody formations. Places like Police IRT (Tiger Base), 34 Army Brigade, State CID and DSS Directorate in Owerri had been so congested that adjoining kiosks and shanties are routinely filled up with detainees.

“A recent visit to Imo Directorate of DSS by one of our activist Comrades and findings made thereto is a clear case in point. Beyond Imo State, another case in point was the latest account of the four Court-freed detained citizens (Ifeanyi Ezennakwe, Tochukwu Undemba, Emmanuel Okeke and Ifeanyi Ifere) held at Onitsha Area Command for six weeks who regained freedom few days ago and revealed how they saw three of their co-detainees died out of torture in their presence and two others killed outside their cells. It has also been found that most of the arrested citizens presently held incommunicado without trial in different police, secret police and other security cells in Imo State and beyond the State are burial/funeral ceremony and church night vigil attendants or returnees; travelers, traders, artisans, sport enthusiasts, etc; arrested and labeled “ESN/IPOB/Unknown Gunmen”. It has also been long read, cited or sighted where police authorities release monthly or quarterly crimes statistics reports showing the number of the arrested armed robbery, cybercrime, homicide, sexual and domestic violence, kidnapping, theft, carjacking, cultism, ritualism, arson, burglary, housebreaking, vandalism and violent land-grabbing suspects. These sets of street crimes, expected of the Eastern Region as “blue-collar social environment” have been collapsed into “ESN/IPOB membership” or “Unknown Gunmen attacks by the drafted security agents”.

Intersociety also said that the Nigerian government had not only refused to fish out perpetrators of heinous crimes but has gone ahead to reward them with promotions and juicy postings.

“The present Nigerian Government had not only refused and failed to fish out senior security officers strongly accused of perpetrating and perpetuating service conduct atrocities since last quarter of 2015 till date (Oct 2022) but the leading perpetrators have systematically been rewarded with promotions and juicy postings; thereby encouraging impunity and repeat-perpetration. The Nigerian Government has further encouraged them to change their original names contained in the military and police records so as to avoid them being tracked locally and internationally by rights and justice groups to account for atrocities committed in service. For instance, the original service names of Col Isa Maigari Abdullahi (as he then was) are strongly suspected to have been disappeared since 2018 after he was posted to Kuru, near Jos for classroom assignment. He was responsible for massacre of hundreds of defenseless street protesters in Anambra State in 2015 and 2016 when he was the Cantonment Commandant of the Onitsha 302 Artillery from where he was transferred in early 2017. Same goes with Lt Col Kasim Sidi Umar (as he then was) who was the barbarous Commander of 144 Battalion of the 14 Brigade, Ohafia in 2016/2017 during which over 280 defenseless citizens were massacred in Aba, Umuahia, Ogwe and Isiala-Ngwa in Abia State. On the other hand, among those recently rewarded with promotions and juicy postings for massacring several hundreds of defenseless citizens in Imo and Abia States in 2021 are Police CP (now AIG) Abutu Yaro under him as Imo CP no fewer than 300 were massacred and over 800 controversially arrested with several disappeared without traces; and Police CP Janet Agbede (now AIG) under her as Abia CP no fewer than 100 defenseless citizens were mowed down and over 300 controversially arrested and scores disappeared,” the statement concluded.

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