Nigeria - Sect leader captured alive, photo evidence emerges

September 1st, 2009

 

 

Lagos (Nigeria) — It has emerged that the leader of the Islamic fundamentalist group, Boko Haram, Mohammed Yusuf, was captured alive last Thursday before the police later allegedly killed him.

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) at the weekend obtained a photograph, which showed that the leader of the Boko Haram sect was alive when captured by the army.

THISDAY also learnt that Yusuf's deputy, who hails from Niger Republic, and a former commissioner in the Borno State Governor Ali Modu Sheriff's administration, Alhaji Buji Fai, were killed in similar fashion.

Fai had resigned his appointment in June 2008 following alleged series of warning by Sheriff that anyone in his cabinet found harbouring extremist religious views should quit before being shown the way out.

The capture and eventual elimination of Yusuf has, however, drawn the ire of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), opposition groups like the Action Congress (AC) and Congress of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP) as well as Human Rights Watch.

According to the BBC, after his capture, the army handed over Boko Haram's leader to the police but only a few hours later journalists were shown his bullet-ridden body.

Days of heavy military bombardment of his base in Maiduguri, Borno State capital, had dealt a fatal blow to Yusuf and his sect members. The police said he had been fatally wounded while trying to evade capture.

Yusuf's Islamic sect is blamed for days of violent clashes with security forces across some parts of Northern Nigeria, which had left up to 700 people dead.

On Friday, the army commander of the operation against the Boko Haram group, Col. Ben Ahanotu, said he had personally captured the sect leader and handed him over to the Commissioner of Police in Maiduguri. He said Yusuf had a wound in his arm, which is clearly shown in the photograph and which had already been treated.

The police, however, insisted he was killed in a shoot-out. The state commissioner of police, Christopher Dega, said Yusuf "was in a hideout, and the forces went there and there was an exchange of fire. "In the course of that confrontation, he sustained his own injury. He was picked up and he later couldn't make it."

But sources in the police had offered a different version of events, saying the sect leader was killed while trying to escape from custody.

NBA has condemned the summary execution of Yusuf, Fai and some of those captured by the security operatives. The association criticised the massacre of innocent citizens and the destruction of properties in the Northern part of the country by the religious militants but added that the reported extra judicial killings of some of those captured by the security operatives must also be condemned.

"We note the effort of the security operatives for rising to the occasion and nipping the horrific incident in the bud. We must also strive to unmask the real sponsors of these deviants and punish them appropriately," NBA President, Chief Rotimi Akeredolu (SAN), said.

In a statement at the weekend, the NBA president said: "We must however, hasten to equally condemn the reported extra judicial killings of some of those captured by the security operatives. It was widely reported that the leader of the Islamic extremist group, one Yusuf, was captured alive. The killing of this man in the police custody, however, reprehensible his deeds must have been, must not be encouraged in a civilized society."

"Anyone suspected of committing an offence must be given adequate opportunities to defend himself. This is a fundamental right that must be protected by all civilized people. The resort to extra-judicial killing by our security operatives is condemnable and we join all other human right groups in calling for an investigation of this repulsive barbarity."

Speaking in the same vein, human rights lawyer, Mr. Bamidele Aturu described the summary execution of Fai as a scary and embarrassing act of reckless extra-judicial killing that must be investigated until those responsible were fished out and dealt with according to law.

CNPP, AC and the Catholic Secretariat of Nigeria (CSN) have also urged the Federal Government to do everything possible to curtail the spread of Boko Haram's activities, even as they traced the remote causes of the sectarian crisis to poverty and underdevelopment.

Also, Human Rights Watch has called for an immediate investigation into Yusuf's killing, which it described as "extrajudicial" and "illegal".

In separate statements, CSN, CNPP and AC also condemned the extra-judiciary killing of the leader of the group by the police. The statement called for a thorough investigation of the origin of Boko Haram, metamorphosis, extra-judicial killings and police killing of Yusuf after his capture by the army, noting that his shooting denied Nigerians the opportunity to unravel his masterminds, financiers, foreign contacts and his network profile.

The coalition of political parties called for a high powered independent inquiry capable of exposing the underbelly of such anti-establishment group, plugging the fault lines, indicting the judges who failed to serve the cause of justice and making public its findings.

Also, Kaduna State Governor Namadi Sambo has expressed gratitude to Islamic leaders in the state for their vigilance in ensuring that the Boko Haram crisis did not spill over to the state.

source.This Day (Nigeria).nca