…for promoting jungle justice and trial by ordeal, Imo State Attorney Gen (Barr Akaolisa) must resign and leave office Onitsha, East...
…for promoting jungle justice and trial by ordeal, Imo State
Attorney Gen (Barr Akaolisa) must resign and leave office
Onitsha, Eastern Nigeria
Sunday, 28th Feb 2021
The International Society for Civil Liberties & Rule of
Law is strongly calling for immediate discharge and acquittal of those paraded recently by the Nigerian Army,
82 Division in Enugu and its satellite formations: the 34 Brigade, Owerri and
the 302 Artillery Regiment, Onitsha. To be released unconditionally, too, are
others abducted and presently languishing in illegal Army and police cells
numbering over 30. For the nine abductees arraigned and remanded, charges
against them concocted by the arraigning authorities must be withdrawn and they
must be discharged and acquitted. Citizens numbering over 33 were paraded by
the Nigerian Army and criminally labeled “IPOB/ESN terrorists and murderers who
recently killed soldiers and innocent civilians in Orlu”. The Army further
claimed that they were “arrested” with “rifles and Biafra insignias in Orlu and
environs”. The Attorney Gen of Imo State and Commissioner for Justice, Barr
Cyprian Akaolisa also gravely misrepresented facts by saying that “among the
arrested were pastors of white garment churches who harbored the hoodlums”.
On the contrary, investigation carried out by Intersociety
clearly shows that most, if not all the paraded citizens are innocent and
defenseless citizens abducted in their homes, church sanctuaries and other
quiet places in Orlu, Njaba, Orsu and Oru Eastern Local Government Areas of Imo
State and some parts of Ihiala and Nnewi South Local Government Areas of
Anambra State. They include Christian clerics of the African Instituted
Churches-a branch of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and some
mentally challenged citizens. The abducted and paraded included nine persons
secretly arraigned last week Friday, 19th Feb 2021 at the Magistrate Court 16
in Owerri, Imo State, labeled “murderers of soldiers in Orlu” and remanded in
Prison or Correctional custody.
Apart from the fact that the abducted and paraded citizens
are not subject of the military necessity or non ‘rival field combatants’,
their abduction, parading and criminal labeling was also done on the grounds of
their religion and ethnicity. Abducting, parading and arraigning mentally
challenged persons for heinous offense of ‘murder’ is a height of jungle
justice and trial by ordeal and clearly offends the hallowed principles guiding
actus reu and mens rea in criminal investigation and prosecution. It is also abuse
of judicial process and a further indication that no form of criminal and
medical investigation was conducted on them. As a matter of fact whoever that
holds forth as the Attorney General of Imo State and Commissioner for Justice
under whom such unpardonable blunder was committed is unfit to continue in
office.
Identities Of The Paraded Clerics & The Mentally
Challenged Citizens
Among the mentally challenged persons abducted, paraded,
arraigned and remanded in Prison or Correctional custody are Citizens Amuche
Oguaju and Ambrose Ibeanuka. Citizen Amuche Oguaju was a 200 Level Zoology
Student of the Imo State University, Owerri who dropped out because of his
mental illness. He was subsequently admitted at a Psychiatric Hospital in
Owerri from where he was referred to a spiritual healing center run by the
House of Prayer International Covenant Church in Okporo-Orlu where he was
responding to treatment before his abduction by soldiers in the early morning
of on 22nd Jan 2021. Citizen Ambrose Ibeanuka, on his part, is an elderly man
in his seventies and a mentally challenged person. He was also receiving
treatment at the same House of Prayer International Covenant Church before he
was abducted same date and time by soldiers.
Also abducted same day at the church were the Presiding
Priest, Pastor Paulinus Izuchukwu Offor and seven others; namely: Johnson
Francis, Izuchukwu Osuzuigbo, Chigozie Onyekaigwe, Obi Nzubechukwu Daniel,
Chukwudi Chukwubueze, Ezenwa Chisindi and Emmanuel Chiadi. Citizen Johnson
Francis and six others were later granted police bail at the Imo State CID,
Owerri after forced payment of hundreds of thousands of naira as “bail fees”
and out of the freed seven, four were hired building laborers working on a new
church building of the Church scheduled for dedication later in the year. On
Friday, 19th Feb 2021, nine of the 33 paraded citizens including the two
mentally challenged persons (Citizen Amuche Oguaju and Elder Ambrose Ibeanuka)
and Citizens Udechukwu Nwachukwu, John Okonkwo, Udechukwu Okwara, Justice
Duruigbo, Odii Goodluck and Paulinus Offor (Pastor in charge of the House of
Prayers Int’l Covenant Church) were arraigned in the Magistrate Court 16,
Owerri on one count charge of “murder” and remanded in the Owerri Prison or
Correctional custody.
Intersociety has investigated further and found that over 12
pastors and 25 church elders, mostly of the African Instituted Churches-a
branch of CAN were abducted and criminally labeled by soldiers of the Nigerian
Army between Jan and Feb 2021. They were abducted in their homes or church
sanctuaries and abominably labeled ‘harbourers’ of “hoodlums”. Their abduction
took place in some communities in Orlu, Njaba, Oru East and Orsu Local
Government Areas in Imo State and some parts of Ihiala and Nnewi South Local
Government Areas in Anambra State. Some of the affected communities include
Ubokoro-Atta, Okporo, Uda Orsuihiteukwa and Okwudor in Imo State and Orsumoghu,
Lilu and Ukpor in Anambra State and mong the pastors abducted and paraded is
Pastor Chigozie Nwaka, Presiding Priest of Our Lord’s Sabbath Church in Atta
Community, Njaba Local Government Area.
In all, not less than 50 defenseless citizens were abducted by soldiers
and there are unconfirmed reports that scores of civilians including about seven
farmers were killed during the Army siege and attacks.
Appointment Of Northern Muslims As Army Commanders In Igbo
Land Army Fuels Killings & Abductions
It is no longer hidden that the Nigerian Army is now being
used to kill, abduct and rape defenseless citizens on the grounds of their
religion and ethnicity. A clear case in point was Obigbo in Rivers State where
the Nigerian Army deceptively claimed to be embarking on ‘secular and
professional military operation targeting criminal citizens’ but ended perpetrating
mass murders and unspeakable acts of torture, abduction, rape and
disappearances. This is to the extent of abducting over 400 defenseless
citizens, out of which over 390 have been traced and serially raping scores of
abducted women in its captivity.
Intersociety has therefore statistically investigated and
found that appointment of Northern Muslims as senior Army commanders in Igbo
Land is fueling killings and abductions targeted at innocent and defenseless
Igbo population. For instance, the present Commander of the 34 Brigade in
Owerri, Imo State is Brig Gen Ibrahim Tukura. The Commander of the 14 Brigade
in Ohafia, Abia State is Brig Gen M. Ibrahim. The Commander of the 63 Brigade
in Asaba, Delta State is Brig Gen A. Idris and the Cantonment Commandant of 302
Artillery Regiment in Onitsha, Anambra State is Col Abdulsalam Abubakar Sambo.
These are not only just to mention but few but also to expose the
ethno-religious motives behind the Army invasion of Orlu and environs and
abduction and parading of defenseless citizens including Christian clerics and
mentally challenged persons.
Imo State Attorney General Must Step Down
The Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Barr
Cyprian Akaolisa, must discontinue and step down. This call of ours is hinged
on his recent promotion of the globally rejected and atrocious practices of
jungle justice and trial by ordeal. Apart from rubbishing and making mockery of
his professional title of “Barrister at Law and Advocate of the Supreme Court
of Nigeria”-the chief custodian of the Repugnancy Test Principle or natural
justice, morality, equity and good conscience, the Imo AG also made himself a
hostile visitor to Section 211 of the 1999 Constitution (office of the State
Attorney General). He misrepresented facts and disappointedly lowered and
impeached the Hallowed Principles of nemo judex in causa sua and audi alteram
partem.
The Imo State Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice
was during his recent press conference quoted as saying as follows: “the church
leaders were arrested (abducted) because they harbored hoodlums against whom
the military operation in Orlu was initiated” and that “if you investigate the
activities of some of these churches, you will understand that over time,
hoodlums establish and use some of these churches as front for their nefarious
activities. We have records that armed robbers have been hanging out as
pastors, in the night they will go for their operations but in the day they
will wear their garments and use such as white garment churches”.
These hostile comments by the Imo State AG also constitute
threats to life and personal liberty, contrary to Sections 33 and 35 and offend
Sections 38 (right to freedom of religion, conscience and thought) and 42
(freedom from discrimination on the grounds of religion or ethnicity) of the
1999 Constitution.
Signed:
For: International Society for Civil Liberties & Rule of
Law
Emeka Umeagbalasi and Comrade Samuel Kamanyaoku (Principal
Officers)
Contacts: Phone/WhatsApp: 08174090052, Email:
info@intersociety-ng.org, Website: intersociety-ng.org
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