Zaria Massacre, the Biggest Massacre in Nigerian History
Tomorrow (12/12/2021) will be the 6th years anniversary of the biggest massacre in the history of the Nigerian state where more than one thousand innocent men, women, children, and infants were brutally murdered by the Nigerian army in Zaria in December, 2015. All the dead bodies were dumped in the multiple Shia mass graves by the Nigerian army two days after the massacre. #ZariaGenocide
The Asaba Massacre that occurred in October 1967 in Asaba, Delta State, during the Nigerian Civil War used to be the biggest massacre before the brutal and inhuman Saudi-sponsored genocide in Zaria.
"No exact death toll for the Asaba massacre has ever been calculated. In 1981, the Asaba Development Council assembled a list of 373 dead, but stated that it was incomplete. Anthropologist S. Elizabeth Bird and historian Fraser Ottanelli estimated that between 500 and 800 people were killed. David Scanlon of Quaker Relief Services reported that 759 men and boys were killed, while journalist Colin Legum wrote that 700 died."
The Nigerian 2nd Division under the General Officer Commanding (GOC) General Murtala Mohammed Ibrahim and ably assisted by Col. Haruna Ibrahim Taiwo executed the Asaba massacre. The genocidal criminals that executed the Asaba massacre spared women children and infants and it was widely reported that the hundreds of innocent civilians killed by the Nigerian army were men and boys.
The former Chief of Army Staff, General Tukur Buratai ably assisted by the General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the Nigerian Army’s 1st Division, General Adeniyi Oyebade, a Major General, executed the Zaria Genocide of 12th-14th December, 2015. Women, children and infants were not spared during the Zaria massacre unlike the Asaba massacre as some of them were burnt and buried alive by the Nigerian army according to the comprehensive report of the London-based Amnesty International on the massacre.
It is important to note that the Asaba massacre was in a war situation during the Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970) while the Zaria massacre was in a peaceful setting in 2015.
The only reason given by the genocidal Buhari regime was a minor traffic offense of road blockade. Some agents of the regime blocked the road of the former Nigerian army chief Tukur Buratai after the killing of seven (7) Shia civilians who were in Zaria for the yearly Flag Changing ceremony at the Iconic Zaria Hussainiya. The Zaria Hussainiya, a religious site was heavily bombarded by the Nigerian army with hundreds of Worshippers inside that included women and children. All of them were killed and the Hussainiya completely destroyed.
What happened in Zaria between 12th-14th December, 2015, was not an ordinary massacre of innocent and defenseless civilians, it was a genocide and the ethnic cleansing of Shia Muslims in Nigeria. When the Nigerian army was mass murdering hundreds of Shia civilians they were all chanting "No Shia in Nigeria!". Shia is a sect in Islam. During the massacre, the Nigerian army specifically targeted the reproductive organs of Shia women and girls screaming "No Shia in Nigeria!". Most of the women and girls died when the Nigerian army shot them in their private parts and stabbed their breasts with riffle bayonets. Few survived.
It is important to note that only the King Salman of Saudi Arabia publicly celebrated the Zaria massacre in a phone call to President Buhari four days after the massacre. We should also note that the Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman in April, 2018, stated in an interview with American Times Magazine that they are behind the Zaria massacre "to curtail the growing influence of Iran on the African continent". The genocidal Buhari regime has not denied this statement.
On a final note, hundreds of families of victims of the Zaria massacre are still waiting for Justice for the genocidal massacre of their loved ones. They want to give their loved ones proper Islamic burial.
Harun Elbinawi
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
