A human rights group, which identified itself as Northern Coalition for Democracy and Justice, NCDJ, has through its counsel, Professor Goran Sluiter, filed supplementary evidence against the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd) at the International Criminal Court of Justice (ICC) over an alleged role he played in the 2011 post-election violence.
Speaking from the Hague headquarters of the ICC on a live telephone conference with reporters in Abuja, Sluiter disclosed that the full version of the case of over 66 pages with the supplementary evidence, including video clips, were submitted to the prosecutor at about 3:00 pm on Thursday.
Secretary -General, Documentation and Research of NCDJ, Dr Ibrahim Baba, who later addressed reporters, insisted that Buhari must be prosecuted to serve as deterrent. He added that the coalition would pursue the case to its logical conclusion, despite death threats from the supporters of Buhari.
He noted that the supplementary evidence which had been submitted for forensic investigation would complement a previous ICC filing submitted by the NCDJ in May, 2011.
Baba averred that the group had enough evidence with which to prosecute Buhari at the ICC for allegedly instigating the 2011 post-election violence which claimed the lives of about 800 people. He said Professor Goran Sluiter, who is an international human rights lawyer and a partner at the Amsterdam law firm of Prakken d’Oliveira Human Rights Lawyers, was engaged to immediately commence the process of Buhari’s prosecution at the Hague.
The Secretary-General asserted that since the Nigerian government could not muster the political will to prosecute Buhari, the groups had to approach the court, as Nigeria was a signatory to international laws.
He denied that their case against Buhari at ICC was politically motivated as the case had been pending since 2011. He said there was no need to keep silent to allow a re-occurrence of similar violence in this election. He said categorically that the post-election violence in 2011 was not spontaneous but as a result of the inflammatory statements by Buhari.
His words: “Based on available evidence, there are compelling reasons to believe that crimes against humanity; including murder, torture, rape; forcible population transfer, persecution and other inhuman acts, were committed in the context of the politically-motivated sectarian violence that immediately followed the Nigerian presidential elections of April, 2011.
“Due to the seriousness of these crimes, the lack of adequate response by the Nigerian authorities, the prosecutor of the ICC will be asked to conduct investigations into the alleged acts and their perpetrators”.
Baba further emphasized that evidence so far collected strongly suggests that the highly inflammatory public comments made by Buhari before, during and after the 2011 elections led directly to the deaths of over 800 people and the displacement of no fewer than 65,000 individuals in April of the same year. (Source: Global Reporters).