An activist group, Women Arise for Justice, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to probe Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State over recent killings in the South-South state.
The group also called on the president to probe the abduction and killing of an army Colonel, Samaila Inusa, in Kaduna.
The over 1,000 women, who stormed the Presidential Villa in Abuja during a peaceful protest, said all the deaths, abduction, intimidation and destruction of property were the product of the do-or-die politics that featured during the last Rivers State re-run election.
National President of the group, Jummai Samuel Pukat, who led the protest, said the governor should be held responsible for all the atrocities since his body language and utterance directly constitute instruction to his political killers to deal with those not on the same side as him.
According to her, “It was Governor Wike who threatened that there are areas that people from the federal level cannot access in the state. It was him who said anyone coming from outside Rivers State for the re-run must first write his or her Will, which implies that he was confident of how to make sure federal agents do not make it out of Rivers State alive”
She said all those who died in the re-run must not die in vain, adding that those who lost their properties must be re-assured that there is still a government and that it enforces the law.
“Our sons, brothers, husband and fathers cannot be continually cut down in their prime with the federal government remaining indifferent simply because their murder took place in Wike‘s Rivers State.
“We cannot wait until more governors join in this killing spree. We dare not contemplate what will happen if Wike’s approach to treating human life becomes the new normal. As mothers, we no longer have the ability to sleep at night when our loved ones have to undertake even the most basic assignment in Rivers State,” he said.
Pukat said the deafening silence from the federal government has made Wike to continue insulting and assaulting our sensibilities with lies meant to shift the blame for the killings of others.
She said history will not be kind to them if the memory of the dead is so desecrated with lies
“Our hearts bleed Mr. President. We are worried and confused and we ask if Rivers State is still part of the Federal Republic of Nigeria”.
