The Kaduna State Police Command has refuted a recent report by Human Rights Watch on the reasons behind sustained violence in some parts of the country.
The Human Rights Watch had blamed the protacted cases of violence on the Nigerian government’s failure to prosecute the perpetrators of the 2011 post-election violence and other crises in Kaduna and Plateau states, as well as the ineffectiveness of the nation’s criminal justice system and the inability of the Police and other security agencies to conduct thorough investigation in the incidents.
In the report, Human Rights Watch blamed violence in the country on government’s inaction, and also identified religion and ethnicity as the sole reason for the incidents.
In the report titled, “Leave Everything to God: Accountability for inter-communal violence in Plateau and Kaduna states”, the group catalogued incidents in Kaduna and Plateau states since 2010, and claimed that over 3,000 people died.
In an interview with Channels Television, the Kaduna State Commissioner of Police, Mr Olufemi Adenaike, expressed reservations that Human Rights Watch proceeded with a fixed viewpoint that perpetrators of violence in the state were never arrested or prosecuted by the Police, without first contacting the command for accurate information.
Adenaike disclosed that so far, the Police have made over 700 arrests and prosecuted more than 100 suspects in connection to the 2011 post-election crisis in the state, adding that it was totally unfair for Human Rights Watch to feed the public with such unverifiable information.
The group, in the report stated that the Nigerian government had ignored years of mass murder in the two states, adding that many of the victims, including women and children, were killed because of their ethnic or religious identity.
The report also blamed the government for failing to act on the reports of several panels set up to investigate incidents of sectarian and communal violence in the country.
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