A PRO-DEMOCRACY and development focused  non-governmental organization, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has threatened to drag President Goodluck Jonathan before the International Crimes Court  (ICC)  if he disregards its advice to take practical and effective measures to stop the killings in Jos and Maiduguri.

HURIWA in a statement made available to The Guardian indicated that the president would face prosecution for crimes against humanity which however will be  “after the expiration of his Presidential immunity from prosecution”.

HURIWA’s threat  came in the wake of  what it called the reported fresh killing of eight villagers in Jos South Local Government Area by suspected security operatives in military uniform. It reminded the president that as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, he may one day be required to appear before the ICC at The Hague, Netherlands if he is so reported. 

The  statement  jointly signed by National Coordinator of the group, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and  National Director of Media Affairs, Ms. Zainab Yusuf, expressed regret that “the sectarian killings have continued especially in Jos, the Plateau State capital, without any pragmatic steps being adopted by the federal government to identify and arrest the actual perpetrators and the masterminds for prosecution for  mass murder of innocent citizens.
“We also remind our dear President that Article 5 of the Rome Statute grants the International Crimes Court jurisdiction over four groups of crimes, which it refers to as the most serious crimes of concern to the international community and includes crimes of genocide and crimes against humanity,” the statement said. 

HURIWA accused  the federal  government of having “failed spectacularly to discharge its constitutional duty that obliges it to guarantee fool proof security and welfare to the citizenry in line with section 14 (i) (b) of the Nigerian constitution”.

Saying it is wrong for the current government to disregard the groundswell of allegations by the villagers in Plateau State that members of the military task force were complicit in the ongoing systematic killings of innocent civilians, HURIWA suggested  “the disbandment of the current special Task force headed by General Hassan Umaru and  the deployment of an expanded joint military task force composed of men from the Mobile Police, Army, Navy, Air Force and the State Security Services (SSS) to be monitored by a United Nations military observation team”.

-Guardian

Posted by admin on Jan 29 2011. Filed under Latest Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry