Unknown Gunmen: Delivering Justice To Victims of Nigeria police Brutality

Unknown Gunmen: Delivering Justice To Victims of Nigeria police Brutality The activities of unknown gunmen is a development that tends to re...

Unknown Gunmen: Delivering Justice To Victims of Nigeria police Brutality

The activities of unknown gunmen is a development that tends to repay the ills the innocent citizens of Eastern Nigeria and other victims of police and military brutalities have long desired. The continued dehumanization and murder of peaceful citizens would remain prevalent, if these avengers did not emerge.

The age long story of Nigeria has always been that of extortion, annihilation, intimidation, injustice and that of the survival of the fittest. It has always been stories of the political class using the police, military and other armed personnel to kill and intimidate the poor, helpless and law abiding citizens.

There was never a time in the history of Nigeria when the country has ever been pleasant but rather, that of bloodshed, horrific and vampiric tales.

There has been many inhumane treatments driven against innocent citizens but the most excruciating of them all, were the several barbaric clampdowns on peaceful protesters. One of such took place at Onitsha on 2nd December 2015, where about eleven (11) family members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), lost their lives in the hands of the Nigerian security forces. 

Another was at Christ the King Cathedral at Aba on the 9th of February 2016. More than twenty (20) family members of the same IPOB were killed by the Nigerian security forces and about twenty (20) more others were arrested. IPOB intelligent report unveiled that the Nigerian soldiers clandestinely killed and burned the corpses of many Biafran activists in another separate incident in Aba. The only offence of those innocent citizens have always been that they peacefully protested against the wrong doings of the politicians, demanding a platform to decide their faith as a people, through referendum.

On 30th of May 2016 Biafra Day Demonstration, series of rallies that commemorated the 1967 declaration of the independence of Biafra from Nigeria, also turned bloody in several cities across the South-East of Nigeria. The Nigerian security forces as well, greeted the peaceful protesters in different states by shooting live bullets at them in attempts to disperse them.

Amnesty International on 24th of November 2016, released a documentary on how the Nigerian security forces killed at least 150 Biafran peaceful protesters. The human rights group also said that the Nigeria military severally fired live bullets with no prior warning, in their effort to disperse unarmed IPOB family members from different protesting grounds between August 2015 and August 2016, though the military and police have been falsely trying to dismiss these allegations, saying that reports were aimed at tarnishing their reputation. The Zaria massacre was also carried out by the Nigerian Army in Kaduna State, Nothern Nigeria, on Saturday 12th December 2015 against Shi'ite muslims, (members of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria). At least 348 civilian deaths were recorded with another 347 bodies secretly buried by the army in a mass grave. 

The most recent one was in the evening of 20th October 2020, at about 6:50pm. Officers of the Nigerian Army opened fire on peaceful End-SARS protesters at Lekki toll-gate in Lagos State (Western Nigeria). Amnesty International stated that at least 12 protesters were killed during the shooting. However, eye witnesses have said that the number is definitely higher, with such claims having loudly been maintained by many on different social media platforms.

These and more are records of the Nigerian security operatives' very bad relationship with the citizens. And it has left the people in perplexity because they (Nigeria armed officers) will even tell you ahead that "if they kill you, nothing will happen" and nothing really happened..So, citizens have only prayed for God's intervention, seeing that even the government appears complicit in these crimes against her own helpless innocent citizens.

Just very recently, we began to hear of "unknown gunmen". Some sets of unidentified arm wielding fellows who have particularly majored in killing these Nigerian security force men, carting away their arms, burning their patrol vehicles and at many other times, burning their police stations, have emerged. The people in government are rattled and this has equally kept the leader of the Nigerian security forces in shock. 

But the victims have simply remained grateful that finally, justice is being served to these murderers in uniform. While the government calls these gunmen "unknown", many people believe they are angels of vengeance sent to avenge the continued killing of innocent citizens because no report has been heard of their arrest, as they are yet "unknown".

As someone rightly posted on Facebook

"Unknown Gun Men, can be defined as Heartbroken Men whose only Brothers were killed, Mothers Raped in their presence, Fathers beheaded, Sister's organs harvested, Nephews made Orphans, Children shot  by Nigeria Security agents, that decided to revenge and brutally seek justice from a murderous establishment, whose Government enjoys the Blood flow of her citizens"

Indeed, I would say that these men (humans or spirits) are fighting holy as they are just warring against those who fought them or rather, avenging for the helpless, depending on whom they are. If this is the only way these security men will learn to desist from the senseless murdering of the innocent citizens they are obligated to protect, then let it continue.

Written by Obulose Chidiebere

Edited by Ogah C.S. Maduabuchi

For Family Writers Press International.

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