A civil rights advocacy group, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has condemned the reported massacre of Onitsha traders by armed state militia.

The group also emphatically told Anambra State Governor, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, that the primary constitutional duty of government is to protect lives and the property of citizens and not to set armed contraptions with armed brutes to kill citizens.

In a statement, the HURIWA argued that “there is no amount of disagreement or peaceful protests by traders against the activities of armed task forces that could permit the deployment of lethal weapons to kill off civilians who are totally unarmed. This incident is one too many and the Anambra State Government is becoming notorious for failing to deal decisively with armed brutes who turned their weapons against the people of Anambra State. For a government to tolerate these incessant attacks on the citizens is to say that the administration has failed woefully. Those who kill in the name of a state government must face the full weight of the law.”

The HURIWA noted that armed operatives of the Anambra State government-backed Ocha Brigade allegedly opened fire at the Onitsha Main Market, Emeka Offor Plaza axis, leaving several people dead and others injured.

The victims were identified as Ebuka Orakwe, Orum Oluebube, Anthony Kosisochukwu, Ifeoma Ezema, Chinwe Igwe, 22, and two others whose names could not be ascertained at press time.

It cited eyewitnesses as claiming that a pregnant woman was among the dead.

The Anambra State Police Command, which confirmed the incident, however, stated that one female victim died on arrival at the hospital, while seven persons sustained gunshot injuries.

It added that the victims had been evacuated to the hospital and normalcy restored in the market.

The HURIWA quoted eyewitnesses who spoke with some sections of the media as claiming that the incident occurred on Tuesday morning, sparking panic and outrage among traders and residents who fled the scene for safety. According to accounts, the victims, who had only set out to earn their daily bread, were shot by armed men reportedly working for the Ocha Brigade.

It added that the reasons for the shooting could not be immediately ascertained.

A trader said, “This is heartbreaking. Four innocent people who left their homes this morning have been cut down in cold blood. Among them is a pregnant woman. Anambra people are now living in fear because criminals have been handed guns and uniforms in the name of government enforcement.”

The Police Command, in a statement by its spokesperson, Tochukwu Ikenga, said police officers moved in to restore order after receiving a distress call.

He explained that an altercation had ensued between personnel of the Ocha Brigade, an Anambra State Environmental Law Enforcement outfit, and some traders, during which seven traders sustained gunshot injuries.

Ikenga added that the incident triggered unrest within the market but assured that normalcy had since been restored, with patrols and monitoring ongoing to sustain peace.

The HURIWA condemned the arming of task forces with lethal weapons and charged the Governor to withdraw these weapons and to only permit these state agents to carry water canons or in a worst-case scenario to bear guns with rubber bullets, which must be applied in such ways that lives are not jeopardised.

In a media release endorsed by the National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Nnadozie Onwubiko, HURIWA accused the Anambra State Government of carrying out serial extrajudicial killings of citizens and for failures to apprehend those behind the spate of violent attacks by armed task forces set up by the Anambra State administration.

The HURIWA quoted Section 33(1) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as providing that: “Every person has a right to life, and no one SHALL be deprived intentionally of his/her life, save in the execution of the sentence of a court in respect of alleged criminal offence of which he/she has been found guilty in Nigeria.”

The HURIWA therefore called for the arrest and prosecution for murders of the task force agents responsible for the state sponsored extra legal killings of citizens. Anambra State must never be turned into a killing field of citizens by agents of the state administration.

Affirming that the situation in Anambra State has become deeply disturbing, the Rights group wondered whether the Anambra State Governor and his officials are unaware of the primary duty of government which the Grund Norm of the country specifically directs as follows in Section 14(2) (B): “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government”.

Just as Section 14(2) (A) provided that: ” Sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria from whom government through this constitution derives all its powers and authority”.  How will a government with a legitimate mandate of the citizens to exercise authority lawfully is incessantly involved in carrying out state-sponsored execution of the citizens?

The HURIWA lamented that since the inception of the administration of Mr. Soludo, hundreds of citizens have been slaughtered by different armed militia groups set up by the Anambra State Government as task forces just as the civil society organization has called on the organised civil rights advocacy groups with operational offices in Anambra State to compile records of all these killings and to file petitions to the International Criminal Court in The Hague Netherlands so both the government officials including the head of the state government and the armed goons set up in the state are charged for crimes against humanity since it is now clear that the Anambra State Government is not disposed to holding State sponsored killers of citizens to account.

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The Rights group condemned the National Human Rights Commission of Nigeria for sleeping on duty, whereas citizens are brutally murdered by state government agents in Anambra State since the past 4 years.

The HURIWA also asked the citizens of Anambra State to take it as a legal obligation to defend their right to life and to denounce the many bloody attacks orchestrated by armed task forces targeting ordinarily law-abiding citizens, even as the HURIWA said there was no legal justification for the massacre of traders that happened in Onitsha.

“This is the time to prosecute state-sponsored mass murderers in Anambra State or the civil society organizations in Anambra State should scientifically generate actionable evidence to institute petitions in the ICC in The Hague Netherlands.  These crimes against humanity by agents of Anambra State must be brought to a logical end, the HURIWA conclusively asserted.