Extra Judicial Killings Under The guise of Fighting Terrorism is Wrong. Dr Reuben Abati (2009)





"The murder of the Boko Haram jihadists by the Nigerian Police Force makes nonsense of this government's avowed commitment to the rule of law; it puts the government to shame. The application of the rule of law cannot and ashoudl not be selective. At the same time that President Yar'çdua had turned himself into a letter-writer trying to preach the rule of law to the Lagos state government on the issue of the 37 Local Council Development Areas, his men in the police were busy across Northern Nigeria executing insurgents in police custody. Only the corpses of Yusuf and Foi have been paraded, several other persons may also have been similarly executed and their bodies dumped in umarked graves. The photographs of the corpses as displayed offer hints of police brutality. Both men were murdered and subjected to great indignity. A police institution that

seeks to enforce the rule of law cannot also violate the same rule of law. What the police have simply shown is that Nigeria is one large jungle where state officials can hide under institutional cover to act like criminals. The police would have been better off following due process. The proper thing to do is to charge all suspects to court and to allow the courts to determine the quantum and nature of punishment for proven crimes committed." Dr Reuben Abati



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