•Stop these senseless killings, HURIWA tasks president
President Muhammadu Buhari has expressed shock and outrage at the killing of innocent persons in Omoku, Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni local Government Area of Rivers State.
The president also condemned the killing of a traditional ruler in Kaduna State, the Etum Numana, Dr. Gambo Makama, and his wife in Sanga Local Government Area of the state on new year day.
The president, who described the incidents as “reprehensible and unacceptable,” directed law enforcement agencies in both states to intensify current efforts in order to speedily bring the perpetrators to face the wrath of the law.
In a statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, president Buhari said: “I have always maintained that nothing justifies the taking of the life of an innocent person.”
“People in our communities must learn to live peacefully.”
He appealed to the communities affected not to embark on reprisal attacks, but allow security agencies carry out comprehensive investigations to properly punish the culprits.
He commiserated with the families of the victims and wished the injured faster recovery.
In the same vein, the All Progressives Congress (APC) also condemned the gruesome attacks on worshipers ushering in the new year in Taiwo Isale area of Ilorin, Kwara State and Omoku community..
APC National Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullah, said in a statement that the party also condemned the killing of Dr. Makama and his pregnant wife.
“We also condole with the government and people of the affected states. It is unfortunate that when people were looking forward to the new year, they were killed and maimed in such gruesome, barbaric and needless manner. There can be no justification for these evil, wicked and callous attacks.
In a related development, pro-democracy and non governmental organisation- Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, (HURIWA) alleged that there are armed freelance killers and killer herdsmen in the country.
In a statement, yesterday, HURIWA expressed worry that these group of people “are having field days across the country, killing, maiming and destroying precious lives and property of citizens without the relevant armed security forces and the different levels of governments adopting fool-proof measures to ending these orgies of blood-curdling attacks.”
HURIWA called on “President Muhammadu Buhari and governors of the major flashpoints of these incessant attacks, such as Kaduna, Adamawa, Taraba, Benue, Kwara and Kogi states, to brace up to the challenges and provide succour to the victims and their families…”
HURIWA, through its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Media Affairs Director, Miss Zainab Yusuf, condemned the killings in Rivers, “in circumstances that can at best be described as shrouded in high wire plots from external forces to instigate a state of unrests in order to justify the calls by some agents of darkness for declaration of state of emergency, to crumble the only strategic state headed by an opposition party governor, Nyesom Wike.”