(Jeff Amechi Agbodo, ONITSHA)
A Human Rights group Human Arise for Change Initiative, (HACI) has attributed the cause of frequent killings of Ndigbo in the northern part of the country to non-conviction of any of the culprits or perpetrators by the law court.
The President of HACI Comrade Vincent Ezekwueme disclosed this in a statement in Onitsha saying that for the fact that no one has been held responsible and brought to book for the barbaric, irresponsible and callous killings of Imo state born woman, Mrs. Bridget Agbahime in far away Kano, the 2005 Apo six killings in Abuja and the 2012 killing of 12 Adazi-Nnukwu citizens in Mubi, Adamawa state, more of such killings would continue unabated.
He said Nigerians, irrespective of religious and tribal affiliations, should learn to respect the sanctity of human lives and urged the government sit up to address the anomalies.
Ezekwueme who is also Anambra state chairman of Campaign for Democracy, (CD) noted that the reason people do evil in our society is because perpetrators of previous evil acts like the Apo six killing of 2005 and the 2012 massacre of 12 Adazi-Nnukwu citizens in Mubi, Adamawa state were allowed to go scot-free without being brought to book.
He lamented that evil people have the impetus to perpetrate more crimes and shed more blood with impunity because up till date, no individual has been convicted for in all the killings.
The President of HACI recommended that adequate compensation should be paid to both the Agbahime family, the Apo six family and Adazi-Nnukwu family, even as he commended Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna state for condemning in strong terms, the wounding of an Igbo man in Kaduna by moslem fanatics who confronted him for not observing Muslim fasting, despite the fact that he is a Christian.
He called on the government to not only pay the hospital bill of the injured Igbo man but also to compensate him for the injury he sustained in the hands of the fanatics and urged Nigerians to live in peace and love one another because we don’t have any other place to live than Nigeria.
He called on President Muhammadu Buhari to implement the 2014 national confab report as a panacea or desderatum towards various challenges facing the country.
According to him, “Buhari should also engage the Niger Delta Avengers in a meaningful dialogue until a compromise is reached. Government should learn to engage all agitators in dialogue through dynamic, tactful and diplomatic means as no amount of sacrifice is too much for peace. Nigerians should be insulars and beneficient rather than destroying Nigeria’s source of revenue generation”.