The pan-northern socio-political group, Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), yesterday said it would continue to resist extra-judicial killings and injustices perpetrated against northerners.
A member of the forum’s Board of Trustees, Ambassador Adamu Mohammed, gave this hint in Zaria, Kaduna State, while leading a delegation of members of the forum on a condolence visit to leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria, Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky, over the recent killing of his three sons and some followers allegedly by soldiers.
Ambassador Mohammed said the ACF would continue to stand firm on all issues that affect the North, especially issues of injustice.
He said: “Our position is that of a pressure group. We will continue to talk as loud as possible against what we consider as injustice against the North. We will pressurise the government to take the issue (murder of Zakzaky’s followers) to The Hague because they are the ones who are supposed to do that”.
Earlier, the Islamic cleric recalled how his sons and followers were killed, saying the action was meant to provoke him and his followers into retaliating so that security operatives would have reason to move against them.
“We give praises to Allah since we are guided by knowledge in all our activities. In the past 40 years, we have not taken guns to fight anyone. How can we do that now? They wanted to provoke us so that they can be killing innocent people in the name of attacking Shi’ites, just as they are doing with the tag of Boko Haram. We all know that there is nothing like Boko Haram. Even if there is, it is a special unit in the armed forces meant to be killing innocent people. We will continue to pray for peace in the country and for the Almighty to expose all those behind these murderous acts. One wonders, up till now there is no any public statement from any government official after several innocent persons were killed in cold blood. It is surprising that the armed forces’ enemies are the citizens of the country who they are supposed to protect”, Zakzaky said.
The delegation delivered a letter of condolence signed by the forum’s secretary, retired Colonel John Ubah to the cleric.
