PRESS RELEASE
Afenifere expresses deep concern over the increasing spate of civilian-army clashes and implores the citizenry, the army and the government to tread the path of justice, peace and unity to prevent total anarchy or breakdown of the country’s processes. The killing of soldiers and the brutal reprisals that have accompanied them in Delta and Abia States have created a crisis of mutual recrimination in recent times. All over the world, citizens revere their soldiers and are only attacked when viewed as an army of occupation. The present situation is unacceptable and Afenifere will not allow itself to be desensitized to these killings and watch the slide towards anarchy. Afeniferetherefore suggests the following as solution:
1. Afenifere calls on the aggrieved citizenry to employ legal democratic means to correct injustices even in the pursuit of their aspirations. Loss of lives through the unbridled disrespect for the law or of taking the laws into one’s hands will only breed anarchy and create situations that criminals and nihilists can take advantage of to conflagrate for their own evil agenda. Elders in communities are hereby called upon to guide their wards away from radicalization and from being used by those with ulterior motives. If and when the Youth attack the State, more often than not, it is the elders, the women, the infirm and children that suffer, as the offending youth are quick to flee.
2. Afenifere’s most profound appeal goes to the army that is reputedly the most disciplined force in the country. We implore the army to desist from inflicting collective punishment on human settlements where they have been challenged or killed. On many occasions, those that carry out attacks against the army do not reside in the area but are mere agent provocateurs. Even if certain people in the community are suspected to have committed the atrocity, international conventions prescribe careful and definitive investigations for singling out the perpetrators.
3. The 1949 Geneva Conventions and other international human rights statutes prohibit collective punishment, specifically so is Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and Article 4 of the Additional Protocol II. Democratic nations would rather allow the guilty escape than to punish the innocent. The army should not allow itself to be ruled by emotions and a sense of retributive justice that could drive them to punish and kill innocent people who they are constitutionally employed to protect. We recognise how painful it could be for soldiers whose colleagues are killed. The Army High Command is encouraged to take proactive steps to defuse the situation by redeploying soldiers that may have been traumatized.
4. Ultimately, the increasing spate of civilian-army clashes should serve as a wake up call to the Commander in Chief and President, Bola Tinubu, to heed the clamour for the restructuring of the polity so as to diffuse rising tensions by creating a just and fair political system to prevent citizens from attacking national institutions especially the army in frustration.
5. The army that is professionally trained to kill should not be deployed within the country to tackle civilian issues, which matters normally belong to the jurisdiction of the police and other civilian forces. In addition to their attitude towards self determination activists and their communities, we have witnessed some level of high handedness even in Abuja, where a whole shopping complex was closed down because of an alleged violation or infringement of a few soldiers’ rights.
6. Across the world there is always a subtle battle of supremacy between force, military regimes in Africa arrested the development of our police to prevent them from being able to challenge military rule and authority in the civil arena. Now, a democratic government needs to accelerate the restructuring of the police to make it more professional, better equipped, with its structure decentralized into multiple levels - community, state and federal, to promote better community relations. Modern police forces are more culturally sensitive and trained in peace and conflict resolution.
7. Finally, Afenifere re-emphasises the requirement to restructure the country to make every citizen and ethnicity justified to be part of a responsive representative governance, as advocated in the 2014 National Conference and in similar Reports. Many of the troubles and anxieties we have witnessed are inextricably tied to agitations for self determination and a rebuff of the distance between the governed and the central government. All these could be put to rest with the devolution of power from the central government to representatives of the aggrieved peoples.
Signed:
Justice Faloye, National Publicity Secretary, Afenifere
