By Uche Mbah
An Abuja High Court has granted the request of the Federal Government to proscribe and declare the Shiite group as a terrorist organization-the second unarmed group to be so designated, even though Boko Haram remains nothing but “our misguided brothers”, according to President Buhari. The first was the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB,
Government has approached a Federal High Court in Abuja Friday to seek an ex-parte order banning the group. In the judgement by Justice Nkeonye Maha, the Court declared that the designated the activities of the Islamic organization in any part of Nigeria as acts of terrorism and illegality. The Court restrains “any person or group of persons” from participating in activities involving the Islamic Movement of Nigeria, IMN, under any name or platform. IMN is the umbrella body of Shiites in Nigeria.
The court then ordered the Attorney General “to publish the order proscribing the respondent (Islamic Movement in Nigeria) in the official gazette and two national dailies.”
The latest Shiite protests has resulted in the death of many members of the Shiite group. While the Police insists that only 11 people were killed, the group has said the figure is about thirty, and that over five of their members died in police custody. An Assistant Commissioner of Police was shot in the head-surprisingly from the back when he was facing the Shiites backed by the police, (the Shiites were mostly unarmed), thereby fueling speculations about who actually killed him, particularly as there was no forensic audit. He was immediately buried.
All these were happening as Iranians were protesting at the Nigerian Embassy in Tehran, calling for the Nigerian Government to release their Nigerian “Ayatolla El Zakzaky”. El Zackzaky plan was to overthrow the constituted authority like Ayatolla Khomeini did in the early seventies in Iran.
Nigeria has been the only country where both IPOB and IMN are regarded as terrorist organizations. IPOB was never in the international terrorist list, but Boko Haram, which the government has not deemed fit to proscribe, lisisted, together with the Herdsmen which the government seem to be protective of.
