STOP THE ON-GOING CARNAGE AT OHAFIA

By Basil Nnanna Otu (Lagos Bureau Chief)

The current post military era democracy in Nigeria is replete with instances of the Nigerian military going berserk on communities, in reprisal attacks over alleged attacks on a member of the armed forces by miscreants operating within or around the community where the military personnel was attacked.

We wish to unequivocally state that we condemn in its entirety the killing or attack on our military men and women as such acts is tantamount to unacceptable affront on the our national sovereignty. However, reactions of the military to such attacks on their personnel come with unimaginable carnage and bloodbath in addition to wanton destruction of properties of innocent members of such communities.

We are living witnesses to what happened at Odi in Bayelsa State in November 1999, where there was a reprisal attack on the Community by the military following the murder of twelve policemen by an armed group. Soldiers went on the rampage in Odi, razed the entire town and killed hundreds of civilians, perhaps as many as 2,000 fellow citizens of Nigeria were killed in that military operation.

The Odi scenario played out once again in Benue State. Between October 22nd and 24th, 2001, hundreds of soldiers of the Nigerian army attacked and killed more than two hundred unarmed civilians and destroyed homes, shops, public buildings and other properties in more than seven towns and villages in Benue State. The small town of Gbeji was among the worst-hit locations; more than 150 people were killed in the small town alone, while more than twenty were killed in the larger market town of Zaki-Biam and others were killed in several other villages.

It was a well-planned military operation, carried out in reprisal for the killing of nineteen soldiers in the area two weeks earlier, which was attributed to members of the Tiv ethnic group. Those who died at the hands of the military were victims of collective punishment, targeted simply because they belonged to the same ethnic group.

A similar reprisal attack, worse in intensity, has been on-going for the past five days as we speak at Amangwu Community in Ohafia, Abia State. This undeclared war was triggered by an allegation that a personnel of the Nigerian Army was on his way back to his base after visiting his village, but got missing at Amangwu in Ohafia. So, soldiers from the Military Cantonment at Ohafia moved in  to search for their colleague. However, members of Ohafia community believe that the on-going military operation in Ohafia is premeditated, a way of getting back to the community for some self-preservation steps taken by Ohafia Community in the near past, which has been a bitter pill to very powerful interest groups.

According to a prominent Community leader from Amaekpu Ohafia, two years ago, the Ohafia community resolved to boycott the consumption of beef in response to the scorched earth policy of the rampaging Fulani terrorists masquerading as herdsmen. He alleged that till date, the Nigerian Army barracks at Ebem Ohafia, doubles as a cattle colony and haven for the Fulani kidnappers to the knowledge of the officers and men of the Nigerian Army.

Things came to a head in 2018, when the Fulani “pastoralists” started encroaching, annexing and renaming an Ohafia village Ihenta (behind the Federal Government College, Ebem-Ohafia); Ohafia monarchs raised an eye brow. Real estate owners and palm plantation owners had their farms and Estates destroyed. He further alleged that bandits and kidnappers find refuge in the army garrison who seem to be at the beck and call of Myetti Allah miscr

eants. A year ago they sent a delegation to Ohafia monarchs urging them rescind the beef boycott order. The Ezeogos demurred. Ever since then Ohafia villagers have been marked men. Youths are all branded IPOB/ESN and hunted down by Nigerian soldiers.

The latest imbroglio was an offshoot of decades of age old land boundary dispute between IKUN community in Cross River State and OKONI village in Ohafia. It will be recalled that the National Boundary Commission had arbitrated on this matter in the 1990s but the IKUN people refused to abide to the boundary arbitral findings. Every now and then, they always made attempt to foment trouble. Last week they raised a bogus alarm of their son who was kidnapped by IPOB/ESN youths at the Okoni-Amangwu corridor in Ohafia. Rather than reporting the matter to the police, they engaged the services of conniving soldiers who invaded Okoni and Amangwu in full battle gear, armoured tanks and flotilla of bleary eyed troops who reduced the two Ohafia villages to killing fields. As we speak over 50 civilians have been killed and houses set ablaze.

Our worry with this manner of jungle justice and carnage by the Army is that while it lasts, the Federal Government will keep mum and the International Community will remain silent. This killings, be it in Bayelsa State, in Benue State and at Ohafia constitute very clear cases of extrajudicial executions by the Nigerian military, contravening Nigeria’s obligations under international human rights law. Yet the Nigerian government has so far failed to take action against the soldiers responsible or against those who ordered the operation, or even to issue a strong condemnation of these killings.

At the international level, foreign governments remain conspicuously silent after each orgy of bloodletting. While some mentioned the Benue killings in private meetings with Nigerian officials, they refrained from doing so publicly. A week after the Benue massacres, the then President Olusegun Obasanjo visited the United States for talks with President Bush and other U.S. government officials, We thought that was a unique opportunity for the U.S. government to raise the issue forcefully. However, U.S. officials did not express any concern publicly about the killings in Benue, and their meetings with President Obasanjo were dominated by discussions about measures to fight terrorism.

We call for an end to the carnage. The bloodbath going on at Ohafia is not healthy for our democracy because of what it portends for the 2023 elections and our international image.