Our Conditions For Appearing Before The Judicial Commission Of Inquiry By The Kaduna State Government

The Kaduna State Government has finally established the Judicial Commission of Inquiry it promised to establish. While the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) has called for the setting up of an impartial and independent Judicial Commission of Inquiry made up of independent persons and members of the international human rights community to unravel the circumstances that led to the pogrom in Zaria and its environs.

It believes that the events of December 12, 2015 that led to the massacre of its members, the maiming of hundreds, the detention of its cadres and destruction of its properties are premeditated and that the Federal and Kaduna State Government are in a face saving measure regarding the gross human rights violations that it deliberately perpetrated.

The Movement believes in the justness of its cause and the fact that

the events that led to the setting up of the Judicial Commission is

premeditated and will appear before the Judicial Commission of Inquiry

only on the following conditions:
That the leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria should be released

unconditionally. The Nigerian Government is holding the leader of the

Movement incommunicado knowing that he is the custodian of the

documents of the Movement and has to give direction to the Movement in

the preparation of its Memorandum and the assembling of its witnesses.

The Nigerian Military and the Nigerian Police must make a full

disclosure of the number of persons in their various detention centers

and grant lawyers of the Movement access to most of them. This is

because the Movement has credible evidence that a large number of its

members are still in detention in military facilities and detention

centers.
The Nigerian Military and the Nigerian Police must also make full

disclosure of the number of persons they took to the various hospitals

and the location of the hospitals to enable the Lawyers of the

Movement have access to them and interview them preparatory to the

inauguration of the Commission.
The Commission of Inquiry must also give full assurance that the

members of the Movement that will give evidence will be fully

protected.
The Kaduna State Government and the Kaduna State Police Command must

disclose the number of persons it has charged to court and the number

of persons it has in prison custody. This is necessary as the Kaduna

State Police Command and the Kaduna State Government illegally and in

a secret procedure granted detention orders against members of the

Movement and herded them to the Kaduna Central Prison without taking

any of them before any Magistrate Court. Presently, over 200 members

of the Movement are in custody at the Kaduna Central Prison.

The IMN has a list of 730 missing persons that are either killed by

the Army or are still in military detention facilities for which the

Army is claiming that there is no single member of the Movement with

them. Those in military detention facilities should be released and

corpses of those killed be handed over to us for befitting Islamic

burials.
There are some members of the panel that are clearly neither impartial

nor credible having shown open hostility to the movement and its

leadership through their utterances, writings or actions in the past.

Some had even called the government to go for the jugular of the

Islamic Movement in the past. The IMN does not see any possibility of

fairness and justice from them due to their stance on the Movement and

Shia. Definitely in their position of arch-enmity with the Movement

compromises any fairness from them in this matter. Independent human

rights bodies should be included in the commission.

These conditions that have been stated need to be fulfilled by the

state government to convince the IMN that the state government, which

is also an accomplice in the crime, since it demolished our properties

and deliberately wiped out practical evidences of the army’s brutality

on the movement, is not setting up the enquiry to justify the

indictment of the Movement by both the federal and state governments.

SIGNED BY
IBRAHIM MUSA
PRESIDENT MEDIA FORUM OF THE ISLAMIC MOVEMENT
0805 078 6093