Eastern Consultative Assembly challenges FG, Kano Govt over Bridget Agbahime
An all-embracve Eastern Consultative Assembly (ECA), has vehemently condemned “the silence and non-arrest and prosecution of Fulani herdsmen who beheaded and carted away the head of citizen Ndubuisi Uzoma in Iddo, airport road Abuja last week.”
This came even as controversy continues to trail the release of the five suspects charged with the murder of the 74-year-old Bridget Agbahime with a strong urge on the federal government and Kano state government to ensure that the suspects were rearrested and brought to justice.
The call was made by ECA in a communiqué issued at the end of its 4th meeting held in Enugu, during which it deliberated on a number of national issues as they affect the place of ndigbo in Nigeria.
In the communiqué signed by the leader of ECA, Chief Mrs. Maria Okwor and secretary, Evangelist Elliot Uko, the group vehemently condemned the release of Dauda Ahmed and his four accomplices who were later freed.
The septuagenarian trader, Mrs. Agbahime, was a victim of religious motivated killing when she was hacked to death on June 2, 2016 over alleged blaspheming of Islam and Prophet Mohammed.
Part of the communiqué read: “We condemn in its entirety the release of Dauda Ahmed and co, who were charged for the brutal murder of 74-year-old Bridget Agbahime in Kano, on June 2, 2016, and urge both the Kano state government and the federal government to re-arrest and retry the 5 murderers in order to bring to justice the killers of this woman, as earlier promised by President Buhari, when the ugly incident happened.”
The group which has in its fold clerics, leaders of town unions, market association, student unions, women and youths organisations warned that “unjust developments” such as the discharge and release of those that shed Igbo blood that without appropriate sanctions that “garner more converts to the secession movement and further make it difficult for our people to believe in one Nigeria.”
“Silence of the authorities over this heinous crime sends shivers down our spine, on the kind of Nigeria, President Buhari is constructing, and the place and future of our people in a Nigeria where our lives don’t seem to count,” ECA lamented.
The stance of the federal authorities on the damning report of the Amnesty internal on the killing of Biafra restoration activists was equally condemned by ECA, which argued that the federal government was advertently fanning the embers of secession.
“The continuous refusal by government to set up a judicial commission of enquiry as demanded by the Senate, Amnesty International and others, over the brutal extra-judicial killings of our youths especially on 9th February, 2016 at National High School Aba and St Edmonds Catholic Church Nkpor on 30th May, 2016 has earned the secessionist groups more sympathy and painted government as the villain. A probe into those killings will reassure all that Nigeria is home for all,” the group said.
The Assembly therefore, urged the federal government to admit the reality on ground to the effect that Nigeria’s continued existence depends on restructuring of the nation along regional autonomy since the people have lost faith in running the country as a unitary system.
“The continued pretence by the central government, that the loss of faith in unitary Nigeria as shown by various agitations for secession can be resolved through force of arms is childish and actually paints government as unserious and insincere about the need to save Nigeria’s future,” ECA said.
