It is our duty to raise an alarm when birds cease to cry like birds. That is why we are worried by the statement credited to the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) to the effect that the immediate past Chief of Army Staff, Lt-Gen. Azubike Ihejirika should be dragged to the International Criminal Court (ICC) over military operations against terrorists in the North.
Chairman of the NEF, Professor Ango Abdullahi, had said in a statement that the group would take Ihejirika to the ICC for “extra-judicial killings by soldiers in Bama and the act of strangulating civilians in Giwa Barracks, using an underground detention centre, while depositing the corpses in hospital.”
Expectedly, the statement has attracted criticisms and, understandably, one of the first critics of the NEF is Senator Uche Chukwumerije who, at a forum in Abuja dared the NEF to go ahead with its plan adding however that should the NEF go ahead with its threat, it would be a good opportunity for other aggrieved regions and people in the country to knock at the doors of the ICC for redress over one form of injustice or the other.
These included the Igbo who would take the massacre of over two million Ndigbo during the civil war to the court, while the other groups would also table their own cases before the international court. “As Ango Abdullahi’s team opens the doors and walks into the hall of the world court, let them realise that they have at last opened the Pandora’s Box”, Chukwumerije said.
We are however happy that the pan-Northern socio-political organisation, Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), is not in agreement with the position of the NEF. Indeed, we align with every point raised by the ACF in dissociating itself from the NEF position on this matter. This tells us that the thinking of the elders’ forum may not necessarily be the position of the entire northern region on the matter; which is heartwarming.
As the ACF rightly noted through its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Anthony Sani,:”The campaigns by the military against the insurgence could not reasonably be personalised against the former Chief of Army Staff. And that is why the military has its own way of bringing to book those soldiers who cross the line in any of such campaigns”. The elders’ forum did not tell us the basis of its conclusion or why the former chief of army staff should be held personally responsible for whatever crimes the soldiers might have committed.
This issue is similar to the claims of marginalisation that nearly every region in the country has been complaining about. If, as Senator Chukwumerije noted, any group decides to approach the ICC for redress over any matter, a lot of past wounds will be reopened because hardly is there any group or section in the country that does not have one grievance or the other to report at the international court. We particularly deplore the ethnic flavour introduced into the matter by the elders’ forum and commend the ACF for its timely dissociating with the forum’s position.
What we would urge, and indeed insist on, is strict compliance with rules of engagement in all military campaign, especially the ones against insurgents, whether in the north or any part of the country for that matter. Where there are breaches, the military should be able to decide those and address them appropriately. This is what we expect the elders to demand instead of fanning the embers of hatred and disunity. It’is high time elders started acting in a statesman-like manner and as the true elders that they are.
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