Shi'ite women protest in Kaduna; ...demands Sheikh El-Zakzaky and wife's unconditional release

Female members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria comprising the Shi'ite sect, on Tuesday in Kaduna, northcentral Nigeria, demanded for the unconditional release of their revered leader, Sheikh Ibraheem El-Zakzaky and his wife.

The women wing of the Shi'ite sect also called for immediate release of their husbands and children that are currently in detention facilities.

The women, who embarked on a peaceful protest to Kaduna Secretariat of Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, carrying poster with the portrait of Sheikh El-Zakzaky, also insisted that corpses of Shiite members killed by soldiers during the Zaria military operation should be released immediately for burial according to Islamic rites.

Addressing newsmen at NUJ Secretariat, shortly after the protest march, Secretary of Shiite Women Wing, Hajiya Aisha Hassan, called on the Federal Government to summon courage and live up to its responsibility to accept its crime by paying Diyya (Death Compensation) to all affected families and relations of the victims of the Zaria massacre.

She also complained that the authorities have remained insensitive to their plights by not showing any concern and unjustly keeping their leader, Sheikh El-Zakzaky in custody without allowing any access to him including injured members denied of treatment.

While noting that it is now three weeks since the Nigerian Army launched coordinated brutal attacks on members of Islamic Movement in Nigeria that killed over 1,000 people in Zaria after over 27 hours of indiscriminate shooting and bombing, she said “these demonic acts perpetrated by the Nigerian army have not only raised the army’s human abuse records, but have also turned a lot of women into widows, children into orphans and have also succeeded in wiping out a lot of families.

“All these have led millions of Nigerians into doubting the truth of existence of freedom of worship in the country as all those killed were only killed for crime of going to celebrate the birth month of Holy Prophet Mohammed.”

She further disclosed soldiers molested their women and removed their hijab which, according to her, is a serious violation of Islamic right exhibited by the Nigerian army.

She said that though there were deliberate attempts to intimidate and instigate Shiite sect members into mob action, she gave assurance that the Shiite members will never resort to anything outside legal process of seeking redress.