Security operative captured gunning down protester

By Hassan Ibrahim & Ahmed Muhammad

A security operative was, on Monday, captured gunning down a protester in Azare, Katagum Local Government Area of Bauchi State.

The unidentified protester was pinned to the ground by some persons who tortured him.

In a video sighted by Daily Trust, the young man was seen lying on the ground as two or three persons hit him repeatedly.

Shortly after, his killer who was standing beside a white Toyota Hilux van belonging to security operatives, moved closer.

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After hitting him twice, the officer point his riffle directly at the victim and immediately pulled the trigger.

The crowd at the scene yelled as the policeman walked away without looking back.

Daily Trust factcheck team ran independent checks on the video and confirmed that it was not doctored.

Checks showed that the incident happened in front of Katagum Local Government secretariat, where policemen and some protesters using Russian flag clashed.

A resident of Azare, who did not want his name in print, told Daily Trust that the deceased was one of the hoodlums arrested by the police, but this newspaper could not independently verify this claim at the time of filing this report.

As of the time of filing this report, SP Ahmed Wakil, spokesman of the Bauchi Police Command, had not responded to Daily Trust’s inquiry on the daylight killing.

Another effort to get the reactions of Bauchi State Government about the incident did not also see the light of the day, as spokesman of Bauchi State Governor, Mukhtar Gidado, neither answered calls nor responded to the messages sent.

Since the ongoing #EndBadGovernance protest kicked off on Thursday, there have been multiple videos of extrajudicial killings against the police, but the force denied each and all of them.

Amnesty International had condemned the use of lethal force against protesters.

In a statement, the human rights group said, “Our findings, so far, show that security personnel at the locations where lives were lost deliberately used tactics designed to kill while dealing with gatherings of people protesting hunger and deep poverty.”

But Muyiwa Adejobi, Force spokesman, had said while there were some instances of killings during the protest, none was by the police.

Following widespread killings in Kano at the weekend, Amnesty International asked Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf to establish Judicial Commission of Inquiry into fatal shooting of protesters,

The agency said at least 10 protesters were fatally shot in Kurna and Kofar Nasarawa of Kano.

President of Nigeria Labour Congress, Joe Ajaero, also warned the Police and other security forces to stop what he described as “massacre” of protesters.

Ajaero, who also questioned the professionalism of the police high command and its officers being superintended by Kayode Egbetokun, said the police, the lead security agency in managing internal security bear the massacre.

The labour leader said the police officers should divert their energy towards marauding bandits wreaking havocs in the country and be brutal against them rather than innocent Nigerians demanding their rights.

“With unconfirmed reports putting casualties at 40+ in two days of managing the the EndHunger protest across the country, we have sufficient reasons (backed up by reports and video clips) to call to question the professionalism of our security personnel as this represents nothing but MASSACRE of citizens.

“Had the security personnel deployed the same thoughtless brutal precision against bandits or other criminals, our country would have been an eldorado. As the lead-agency in internal security management, the police bear the burden of this massacre,” he said in a statement,

In a piece titled: ‘The Hunger March As Universal Mandate’, Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, wrote, “Live bullets as state response to civic protest – that becomes the core issue. Even tear gas remains questionable in most circumstances, certainly an abuse in situations of clearly peaceful protest. Hunger marches constitute a universal S.O.S, not peculiar to the Nigerian nation. They belong indeed in a class of their own, never mind the collateral claims emblazoned on posters.”