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RELIGION-NIGERIA: One Year On, Perpetrators of Violence Remain At Large

Toye Olori

LAGOS, May 27 2005 (IPS) - One year after some 900 people were slaughtered in clashes between Muslims and Christians in Nigeria, the government of President Olusegun Obasanjo has failed to prosecute those responsible for the cycle of violence, a Human Rights Watch report charges.

The 75-page report, ‘’Revenge in the Name of Religion: The Cycle of Violence in Plateau and Kano States”, provides the first detailed analysis of the incidents and the factors that continue to threaten the stability of central and northern Nigeria.

The report, released Wednesday, provides detailed documentation of two major outbreaks of violence in the town of Yelwa, Plateau State, in February and May 2004, and a reprisal attack in the northern city of Kano in May 2004.

Reacting to the report, Nigeria’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) spokesman, Mike Okono, says religion is an emotive issue and that there should be ”no victor, no vanquished” when tackling the problem. According to him, the belligerents will eventually come together and reconcile.

‘’Unlike in the southwest (region), where the problem of religion is less noticeable because within a family there are Christians and Muslims, it is different in the north. The incidents in Plateau and Kano were politically motivated by politicians for their selfish interests, when they whipped up religious sentiments to win votes during elections,” Okono told IPS in a telephone interview.

Peter Takirambudde, director of Human Rights Watch’s Africa Division, blamed the government for the killings in the two states. He claimed that security forces were absent while hundreds of people were being massacred in Yelwa/Shendam in Plateau State. And that instead of protecting those at risk and arresting the perpetrators, police and soldiers, who were later deployed at the scene of the conflict, shot people on sight.

‘’The warning signs were there for a long time,” Takirambudde said. ‘’But the government chose to do nothing until the situation spiralled out of control.”

In a statement on May 12, 2004, the commission, which is an independent body, condemned ‘’the senseless, gruesome and barbaric massacre of hundreds of people in Yelwa/Shendam by a group of lawless tribal militia and their sponsors”. Okono argues that the removal of the state governor and imposing a state of emergency to restore law and order showed that the government was concerned about the violence in Plateau State.

The commission said the Plateau State Government, which has the primary responsibility to ensure the security of lives and properties, proved incapable, while security agents looked the other way during the massacre.

Okono described as outdated the report by the Human Rights Watch.

‘’They (Human Rights Watch) give the impression that nothing is being done internally. They did not even mention the efforts being made by non-governmental organisations and commissions like ours to ensure that peace and stability returned to the affected areas,” he argued.

‘’Foreign organisations, who write about the problems in that part of the country, do not understand that these are people who have lived together for centuries; they share common culture; have common market and eat common food without any distinction except the difference in religion. All that is needed is to reconcile them as they are bound to come together as one after each crisis,” he added.

Okono urged the government to improve the economic conditions of Nigerians in order to reduce religious tensions.

‘’This is one thing the National Human Rights Commission has been preaching and advocating. The international community and NGOs (non-governmental organisations) should help the country improve the economic life of the ordinary people which will help minimise crisis,” he said.

In its report, the Human Rights Watch notes that at the heart of the conflict is the distinction between ‘indigenes’ – people who consider themselves as the original inhabitants of an area – and those whom they view as ‘settlers’. The concept of ‘indigeneship’ has been exploited and used to discriminate those termed as ‘settlers’.

‘’The Nigerian government needs to remove the distinction between ‘indigenes’ and ‘settlers’,” Takirambudde said. ‘’As long as this distinction is given official recognition, the potential for further conflict remains.”

Okono does not believe that distinction between indigenes and settlers is given official recognition by the government but a creation of the political class. ‘’We do not have in the Nigerian constitution indigenes and settlers. It is basically a creation of the political leaders to manipulate the citizens for their benefit,” he explained.

He said the commission had sent a memorandum to the National Assembly to look at the problem of indigenes and settlers. It has also submitted recommendations to the on-going National Political Reform Conference to ensure that indigene or settler do not find their ways into the country’s constitution.

Like Takirambudde, Okono wants those responsible for the violence in the two states to be brought to justice as part of measures to prevent a recurrence of the conflict. ‘’Most of these violence are politically motivated. Therefore, we are insisting that whoever is involved should be taken to court and if found guilty should receive severe punishment as deterrent to others,” he told IPS.

‘’The government needs to do much more to ensure lasting peace in the affected areas,” Takirambudde said. ‘’The authorities need to send a clear message that those responsible for these killings will be arrested and prosecuted. The impunity protecting the perpetrators has only encouraged further violence.”

Plateau State has recorded several incidents of violence in the last four years, starting with the outbreak of violence in the city of Jos in September 2001, in which around 1,000 people were killed in less than a week. Between 2002 and 2003, violence spread to other parts of the state. Human Rights Watch estimates that between 2,000 and 3,000 people have died in communal violence in the state since 2001.

In the central region that lies between the mainly Muslim north and largely Christian south, armed Muslims on February 24, 2004 killed more than 75 Christians in the town of Yelwa, at least 48 of them inside a church compound. Then on May 2-3, hundreds of armed Christians surrounded the town from all directions and killed around 700 Muslims. They also abducted scores of women, some of whom were raped. Both attacks were well-organised and, in both instances, the victims were targeted on the basis of their religion.

A week later, Muslims in the northern city of Kano retaliated by attacking Christian residents of the town, killing more than 200. In addition, police and soldiers deployed to restore order in Kano were alleged to have carried out dozens of extrajudicial killings themselves.

 
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