Genocide Alert for Nigeria

PHOTO: A dead body is pulled out from a well to be carried away following a violent clash in the central Nigerian city of Jos. (Tolerance)

The horrific violence that culminated into a massacre in the central Nigerian city of Jos last week raised serious concerns that underlying social, ethnic, and religious issues continue to encourage sectarian attacks between Christians and Muslims.

The reality of these issues became blatantly clear over the weekend in a predominantly Muslim village just south of Jos, where searchers discovered over 150 bodies of men, women and children shoved into wells and sewage pits in an attempt to cover up a massacre. Several of the bodies pulled from the wells were decapitated and dismembered. Most bore signs of being killed by axes, scythes, and machetes.

To make matters even worse, the Civil Rights Congress in Nigeria stated today that it has collected over 150 text messages sent leading up to most recent wave of killings that encouraged the wholesale slaughtering of civilians of the opposite group.

Thus far, the international community and anti-genocide groups have done little to acknowledge horrific events such as these that have plagued central Nigeria, especially in Jos, for years now. Impunity for crimes committed remains rampant due to government inaction, lack of clear international outcry, and a seemingly weak response, if not zero at all, from anti-genocide activists.

Genocide Alert for Nigeria

Before today, last week’s killings have lacked the probable cause needed to make a declaration that genocide is being planned, committed, or covered up. Under Article 2 of the United Nations issued Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which clearly states:

“any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group as such:

1. Killing members of the group;

2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”

there has seemingly been a lack of “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part” concerning the violence that often times plagues Jos. While sections 1 and 2 have been committed for years now in Jos and other areas of central Nigeria, the lack of “an intent to destroy” has kept a declaration of any planning and committing of genocide away.

However, a statement issued by the Civil Rights Congress in Nigeria today has brought to light that in the hours leading up to and during the violence in Jos last week, over 150 text messages were sent out to civilians encouraging them to attack members of the opposing side, whether it be Muslim or Christian. According to Shehu Sani, the president of the Civil Rights Congress in Nigeria, the messages gave readers addresses to mosques and churches and suggesting that they be burnt to the ground.

Many of the text messages also used threats of violence to the readers to encourage direct attacks on civilians from the opposing background. According to Sani, one text message read:

“Slaughter them before they slaughter you. Kill them before they kill you…Throw them in the pit before they throw you. Encircle and suppress them before they encircle and suppress you.”

The timing that the text messages were sent also shows a desire by certain elements in Nigeria to wipe out in whole or in part those that are of a different ethnic and religious background. The majority of the text messages were delivered by the senders at the time the violence went from being just an apparently small dispute over the rebuilding of a Muslim home in a predominantly Christian neighborhood to a city-wide riot. According to Sani, they played a major role in changing the dispute to an eventual massacre in the predominantly Muslim village of Kuru Karama south of the city center.

Immediate Action Needed

While the level of planning for an apparent larger-scale killing spree seems to have been narrowly avoided, these text messages now show that there is clear evidence of a desire and action to kill many more. Since those being targeted by the senders of the text messages are of a certain religious and ethnic group, under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide there is sufficient evidence that planning, at some level, for widespread massacres such as the one committed in Kuru Karama was and possibly still is underway.

Because of this, the United Nations and/or the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS,) of which Nigeria is a member, should send investigative teams into Jos since the government has thus far proven itself incapable of bringing the killers and those responsible to justice. These teams should focus on things:

• Discovering the identities of those who participated in the killings at all levels (from those wielding the weapons to those who encouraged and coordinated the attacks via text messages)
• Have Nigerian security forces arrest those who were responsible to prevent future attacks. Members of the investigative teams should be present at every arrest to ensure that human right’s abuses are not committed and to protect those responsible for the attacks from the security forces, who have a long history of using excessive force.
• Break the cycle of impunity by holding special trials for those responsible within Jos. During this time, community leaders from both sides should focus on reconciliation under the auspices of the Nigerian government. Currently, there are no serious efforts to bring both sides to a lasting peace.

Regardless of what action is taken, or not taken, the anti-genocide activist community must take immediate action by calling for an investigation into the killings. This way justice can be made a priority and potential future outbreaks of violence can be prevented. While Sudan and eastern Congo are of great importance, the anti-genocide community must also focus on prevention. By stepping in this early in Nigeria, the current trend of genocidal massacres in Jos can be prevented in the future and replaced by reconciliation.

This is a perfect opportunity for the anti-genocide movement to widen it’s current gaze from places were genocide, war crimes, and human right’s abuses are underway and also focus on prevention. A crisis is much more easily averted by dealing with it before it begins, and, when it comes to dealing with genocide and genocide-related crimes, failure to deal with it before the killings begin results in widespread humanitarian consequences and repercussions that were made blatantly clear during and after the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Because of this, the question for activists when it comes to dealing with the issues surrounding genocide in Nigeria is not “Should we act?” but “When and how do we act?” While genocide prevention and ending efforts in Sudan are fully underway by activists, our sights must also be set on other less known areas such as Jos due to the spreading nature that genocide so often bears. Not acting means that over time prevention efforts will become much more difficult.

The time to act on behalf of Nigerians is now. To learn how you can take additional action on this matter, please click here.