Amnesty International (AI) has urged the Nigerian Military to respect the rights of the citizens in the northern states under the president’s state of emergency declaration.
The charge came on the heels of the Military’s continuing clampdown on members of the Boko Haram islamist sect in the affected states, which has already led to the death of hordes of suspected terrorists and the fleeing of thousands of people in the region to neighbouring Niger Republic.
“Issues of national security and the state of emergency do not give the military carte blanche to do whatever they want,” Deputy Director for Africa, Amnesty International, Lucy Freeman said in a statement. “The onus is on the state to prove that they are not using an emergency as justification to run roughshod over people’s human rights.
“The government must immediately launch a full and effective investigation into the many recent deaths and disappearances in Borno State, including looking closely at how dead individuals end up in the back of military vehicles.”
According to AI, military response to the Boko Haram scourge has been fraught with extra-judicial executions, enforced disappearances, indiscriminate torching of civilian housing and arbitrary detention. Of late, particularly, there have reports of indiscriminate mass arrests in Borno State coupled with denial of detainees their right to lawyers and families.
“Given the history of human rights violations by the security forces during house-to house-searches, any escalation of such operations is extremely concerning,” Lucy added.
“The security forces appear to have repeatedly used firearms against people when there is no imminent threat of death or serious injury. The Special Advisor added that the curfew would mean only ‘troublemakers or those that want to confront the military’ would break the curfew, and that those people ‘will be dealt with summarily.
“The Special Advisor seems to suggest a ‘shoot on sight’ approach to anyone who breaks the curfew. Whatever the emergency, a state can never derogate from the fundamental principle of the presumption of innocence.”
She urged President Goodluck Jonathan to order the Military to respect human rights and the rule of law, as it is not above the law, saying, “The government has an obligation to ensure the safety of all Nigerians, firstly by addressing the attacks from Boko Haram, but also by eliminating the human rights violations carried out by the very state security forces who are supposed to provide protection.”
