₦airaland Forum

Don’t use force on protesters -Bishop

From Jeff Amechi Agbodo, Onitsha and David Onwuchekwa, Nnewi

Campaign for Democracy (CD) has urged the military to leave pro-Biafra groups alone but face immediate challenges of Boko Haram insurgence that has ravaged the North East.
The group said threats by the military to clampdown on pro-Biafra groups, who were protesting the arrest of leader of Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) and Director of Radio Biafra, Mr. Nnamdi Kanu was unconstitutional and abuse of human right should they venture into it.
CD Chairman in the South-East, Dede Uzor A. Uzor, said the group has constitutional right to embark on peaceful protest calling for the release of their leader who was arrested by security agents. He further added that any attempt by the Army to touch any member of the group would amount to breach of fundamental human rights of the members, which he said was against the international court justice.
In a related development, General Overseer of Mount Zion Faith Global Liberation Ministries a.ka. By Fire By Fire, Nnewi, Anambra State, Rt Rev Bishop Abraham Chris Udeh has warned against the use of force on the protesters.
Bishop Udeh gave the warning, yesterday, at Akabukwu Uruagu, Nnewi after a ministration. He said threats by the military to use force against those demanding for Kanu’s release would be counter-productive and was capable of over-heating the polity.
He said the only thing that could stop the protest naturally would be to release Kanu unconditionally to calm the protesters who might not succumb to any threat unless he regained his freedom.
He said due process of the law should be followed by producing Kanu in court than his continued detention without trial.
According to him, “Inline with our constitution especially in Chapter 4 and chapter 33 to 40 of 1999 constitution as amended, the military has no right to use force against the defenseless pro Biafra groups who were protesting the release of their leader arrested. If the federal government can release their leader that solves the problem but court of competent jurisdiction has given an order that a particular condition should be met before the release of the man and they have met the condition why are they still holding the young man. The man was supposed to appear before the court yesterday but they refused to bring him to court which made the court to issue order to bring him to court alive or death on November 23”.
“The federal government is violating the law, the law they supposed to keep that they are now violating. The military threat is empty because it seems that the military is ignorant of the law as far as the pro Biafra protesters were taking laws into their hands. Peaceful Protest cross the globe is allowed as far as it is inline with the law, if they don’t go into violent protest with arms destroying things, destroying government property but in this case it is civil protest against the arrest of their leader, government should listen to know why they protesting, it is inline with democratic trends. So the military is ignorant of the law and that is why they are making empty threat and they cannot do anything”.
“We are calling for overhauling of military personnel because they lack the capacity to fight the Boko Haram in the North, there us serious security challenges in the Northern part of country and they have failed to address the issue but threaten the group without arms who are defenseless. So, the CD and other Civil Society condemns the threat by the military against pro Biafra groups” Uzor stated.
He however advised the President to look inward to actually know whether the security men were obeying the law or violating the law of the country, saying that court has spoken over the matter and Kanu should be released “ we are moving to anarchy if the security agencies cannot obey court order. So federal should be mindful of what happened in 1983 enactment decrees against humanity”.
The CD also called on federal government set panel to unravel the killings of some youths during the protest and pay compensation to the families of those that were killed during the peaceful protest across the South-East and parts of South-South geopolitical zones.

http://sunnewsonline.com/new/cd-condemns-armys-threat-to-pro-biafra-groups/#prettyPhoto

FOOLS! HYPOCRITES! Believe in Nigeria at ur detriment. May God dismember this country hastily and peacefully.

You will not die.

[quote author=Emekamex post=39643862][/quote]Baratheon

Sparrow13:
DILECTOR and his cronies are now my constant source of laughter

From laughter to madness..

Yhinkss:
Comfused people.

If you can retrospect, you are always caught unawares, and this can never be different.

mulattoclaro:
I'm not surprised. Everyone is yoruba. I'm proudly Edo and of German ancestry. I've got no yoruba blood in me flattie.

Edos are bloody vampires and have no share in Biafra. Edo was never and can never be part of biafra. Go and practise your witchcraft with the yorubas. YOU ARE NOT NEEDED IN BIAFRA.

Aigbofa:
So, he was made to "dobale" and flogged with his ornaments.
Empty pride.

You should cover ur face in shame. Your lilly-livered Oba cant stand Eze Ndi-igbo; no wonder he had to gather as many as 200 useless, idle yeriba touts just to harass Eze Ndi-igbo of Akure and his outnumbered entourage. Yeriba and cowardice are into eternal covenant since time immemorial.

A huge stampede killed at least 717 people and injured hundreds more at the hajj in Saudi Arabia on Thursday, in one of the worst-ever tragedies at the annual Muslim pilgrimage.
Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

The stampede, the second deadly accident to hit the pilgrims this month following a crane collapse in Mecca, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said.

Bodies of pilgrims wearing traditional white clothing were left scattered by the crush, surrounded by discarded shoes, flattened water bottles and umbrellas that had been used for protection from the sun.

The civil defence service said that it was still counting the dead, who included pilgrims from different countries, and that at least 863 people had also been hurt.

Nearly two million people from across the globe were attending the hajj, one of the largest annual gatherings in the world.

Iran said at least 43 of its citizens were dead and accused Saudi Arabia of safety errors that caused the accident.

But a Saudi minister blamed the pilgrims themselves, saying they had not followed the rules laid out by authorities.

“Many pilgrims move without respecting the timetables” set for the hajj, Health Minister Khaled al-Falih told El-Ekhbariya television.

“If the pilgrims had followed instructions, this type of accident could have been avoided,” he said, vowing a “rapid and transparent” investigation.

– ‘Tripping all over each other’ –
Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

The stampede began at around 9:00 am (0600 GMT), shortly after the civil defence service said on Twitter it was dealing with a “crowding” incident in Mina, about five kilometres (three miles) from Mecca.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims had converged on Mina on Thursday to throw pebbles at one of three walls representing Satan, for the last major ritual of the hajj which officially ends on Sunday.

A hospital official told AFP the incident happened outside the Jamarat Bridge structure, where the stoning takes place. A group of pilgrims leaving the area collided with another group that was either moving in the opposite direction or camped outside, the official said.

A Sudanese pilgrim in Mina said this year’s hajj was the most poorly organised of four he had attended.

“People were already dehydrated and fainting” before the stampede, said the pilgrim who declined to be named.

People “were tripping all over each other”, he said, adding that a Saudi companion had warned him that “something was going to happen”.

Helicopters were flying overhead and ambulances were rushing the injured to hospital, AFP reporters at the scene said.

At one hospital, a steady stream of ambulances discharged pilgrims on stretchers.

The incident came as the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims marked Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice, the most important holiday on the Islamic calendar.

– 2 million pilgrims –

It was the second major accident this year for hajj pilgrims, after a construction crane collapsed on September 11 at Mecca’s Grand Mosque, Islam’s holiest site, killing 109 people including many foreigners.

The hajj is among the five pillars of Islam, and every capable Muslim must perform it at least once in a lifetime.

For years the pilgrimage was marred by stampedes and fires, but it had been largely incident-free for nearly a decade following safety improvements.

In the last major incident in January 2006, 364 pilgrims were killed in a stampede during the stoning ritual.

In 1990, a huge stampede in a tunnel at Mina after a ventilation system failure killed 1,426 pilgrims, mainly from Asia.

Thursday’s tragedy occurred outside the five-storey Jamarat Bridge, which was erected in the last decade at a cost of more than $1 billion and intended to improve safety during the pilgrimage.
Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

Almost one kilometre (less than a mile) long, it resembles a parking garage and allows 300,000 pilgrims an hour to carry out the ritual.

Official figures released Thursday said 1,952,817 pilgrims had performed this year’s hajj, including almost 1.4 million foreigners.

Foreign embassies were working to identify and assist their citizens caught up in the stampede.

In Tehran, Saudi Arabia’s Shiite rival Iran said authorities at the hajj had closed off two paths near where the accident later took place.

“This caused this tragic incident,” the head of Iran’s hajj organisation, Said Ohadi, told Iranian state television.

– Iranian accusations –

“Today’s incident shows mismanagement and lack of serious attention to the safety of pilgrims. There is no other explanation. The Saudi officials should be held accountable,” he said.

After saying the kingdom was responsible for the tragedy, Iran’s deputy foreign minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said Riyadh’s envoy to Tehran would be summoned to the foreign ministry.

The faithful had gathered until dawn Thursday at nearby Muzdalifah where they chose their pebbles and stored them in empty water bottles.

They had spent a day of prayer Wednesday on a vast plain and Mount Arafat, a rocky hill about 10 kilometres (six miles) from Mina, for the peak of the hajj.

The ritual emulates the Prophet Abraham, who is said to have stoned the devil at three locations when he tried to dissuade Abraham from God’s order to sacrifice his son Ishmael.
Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

Saudi emergency personnel stand near bodies of Hajj pilgrims at the site where at least 717 were killed and hundreds wounded in a stampede in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, at the annual hajj in Saudi Arabia on September 24, 2015. The stampede, the second deadly accident to strike the pilgrims this year, broke out during the symbolic stoning of the devil ritual, the Saudi civil defence service said. AFP PHOTO / STR

At the last moment, God spares the boy, sending a sheep to be sacrificed in his place.

The world’s Muslims commemorated Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son by slaughtering cows, sheep and other animals on Thursday.

Celebrations of Eid al-Adha were also marred in neighbouring Yemen, where a suicide bomber struck a mosque in the capital Sanaa in an attack targeting Shiite worshippers that killed at least 25 people and wounded dozens during prayers.

The attack was claimed by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group, which has carried out a string of bombings in recent months targeting Shiites.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/09/717-killed-in-worst-ever-hajj-tragedies-in-mecca/

Biafra is my home.

God is with us.

Na who wash am. Amaechi is no cleaner than a pig reared in Ibadan; very dirty.

elookoo:
I don't go to Facebook to campaign against mark zukerberg, why should ibos come to a Nigerian site to agitate for Biafra, simple GET YOURSELVES A BIAFRA WEBSITE TO CAMPAIGN FOR YOUR BIAFRA, ITS A FREE WORLD

You ain't intelligent at all. When has agitatiin for self-determination equals campaign against Seun or whatever he is called. WE WILL CONTINUE UTILIZING NAIRALAND TO PROPAGATE BIAFRA ACTUALIZATION. YOU AND YOUR SEUN CANNOT DO ANY SILLY THING.

Thought they said this is the era of merit? They will shout 'merit' if, and only if it favours the north. Bunch of jokers.

walemoney007:
Nnamdi kanu and IPOB leaders are all scamming d flat heads from the South East,but I don't give a dam

But how is this ur concern? Mind ur biz, idle mind.

laudate:
Your article merely says the Ijebu migrated from somewhere called Sudan, and settled in what is present day Nigeria to become part of Yoruba land. Even the traditional ruler of Ijebu agrees that everybody migrated from somewhere.

You have still not answered my former question: "Is Adetona, not a Yoruba name?" Or is it a Sudanese name, or an Igbo name?

See ur life, you are running helter skelter confusedly seeking for refuge.

So Adetona is yoruba but Amaechi is not Igbo? If u like visit ur oba Akiolu of lagoon kingdom for clarification, Ijebus and Aworis are not Yorubas.

mcvaeey:
Asari Dokubo is not the spokesperson for us. He doesn't represent us. He's just a sore loser. Wait and see.

And u are now the spokesperson. DRY FISH.

Yoruba and fetish practices.

coolitempa:
Those whom the gods are about to destroy....they first make mad...... ....nonsense...... ....get biafraudian....

Be careful how u tread that u may not die mysteriously.

NgeneUkwenu:
Abusing Ndi Awusa na Ndi Yoruba is their only certificate to claim Igbo.


Ndi Ara na gaghari na intaneti"

You are a gigantic fool. Prove to me beyond reasonable doubt that yorubas and hausas do not abuse the Igbo. Onye nzuzu. Ichoro i ma ihe.

Shachris is a medically confirmed mentally deranged person. Take him serious at ur own peril. He will soon hang himself.