Parents of the 10 secret service operatives killed in the Ombatse attack in Nasarawa State nearly three
months ago staged a protest before Vice President Namadi Sambo in Lafia yesterday, saying they wanted justice and would not forgive the killer-cult.
Shortly after the violence in Alakyo, near Lafia, on May 7 in which dozens of security men were killed, director general of the State Security Service (SSS) Ita Ekpenyong said the service had forgiven killers of the 10 SSS men.
But parents of the operatives, carrying placards and chanting slogans, said yesterday there would be no forgiveness for the Ombatse cult. As early as 9am, the protesters crowded up in front of Federal High Court building which the Vice President was due to commission.
They lined up along the road where Sambo’s convoy would pass on its way to the court premises.
Sambo arrived along with Governor Umaru Tanko Al-Makura and Information Minister Labaran Maku, who is an indigene of the state. They were greeted by the protesters who raised their placards and chanted: “We want justice, we want justice for our children!”
But security men barred the protesters from going near the complex throughout the event.
The commissioning went on without any incident, and the Vice President left the venue at about 12:21pm, and again passed by the protesters lined up along the road.
Messages on the placards include: ‘Pls Help, Help, Mr. President, We Need our Children Dead/Alive,’ ‘We Are In Deep Pain, Mr. President, Pls Intervene,’ and ‘All We Are Saying, It’s Been 12 Weeks Since Then.’
Speaking to Daily Trust, the protesters, most of them elderly people, decried what they perceived as the Federal Government’s lukewarm attitude to the murder of their children by Ombatse.
They said they were shocked that the government has not said or done anything to demonstrate feeling for the parents and other family members of the slain SSS operatives.
Dr. Nandul Durfa, 64, father to a late operative called Timman Durfa, led the protesters. He told Daily Trust they mobilised by making telephone contacts with each other and then met in Lafia on Sunday evening to agree on the inscriptions for their placards.
He said he called two other parents, Madaki Damian from Abuja and Nimsel Nanyal from Jos, Plateau State, to join the protest.
“We mobilised ourselves by phone. We have been in touch with each other since the incident. I called Madaki and Nimsel. They then placed calls to contact others like Gobir who came from Awe in Nasarawa, and Madam Mrs. Godiya Makama who came from Nasarawa-Toto, also from Nasarawa State,” he said.
“There were others who are not parents, but representatives of parents of deceased. They too showed up. Altogether, we are about 17.”
Durfa said they decided to organise the protest because government had not done anything to the Ombatse killers.
“We are saying it is now three months since that incident and government has not done anything to give us confidence in them,” he said.
“Our children were sent on an operation to save other Nigerians, and they were not given any protection. We can’t see them alive; we can’t see their corpses.”
Durfa said the SSS authorities only sent them death certificates of their children. “They only sent us death certificates of our children.
There were no corpses sent to us. We want the corpses of our children. They should go to that village and retrieve those corpses and hand them to us, so we can bury our children,” he added.
Saidu Isah Gobir, another elderly protester who also lost his son in the murder, said he travelled to Lafia to tell the President or his representative that he disappointed them over the murder.
“They have kept quiet as if nothing happened. We lost children in that operation; that they must know. We are angry. All we are told is that the SSS has announced forgiveness. We don’t want to hear that,” Gobir said.
Another protester, Nimsel Nanyal, 57, who held a placard with the inscription “Pls Mr. President, Its Now We Want Fresh Air,” told Daily Trust that he received a death certificate for his son and has waited three months to hear about government’s steps towards giving his son justice but has been disappointed so far.
“I am disappointed that security men were killed and government cannot give them justice,” he said.
“In Britain, one soldier was killed on the street, not in the line of duty as our children, and the British Prime Minister was everywhere making statements. He even attended the burial. Here, we were sent certificates, and that is all,” Nanyal added.
Yesterday’s protest came three weeks after wives and other family members of the slain operatives created a scene at the Government House in Lafia when they disrupted the singing of the Nation Anthem during a visit by some governors.
Governors Martins Elechi (Ebonyi), Muazu Babangida Aliyu (Niger), Mukhtar Ramalan Yero (Kaduna) and Sule Lamido (Jigawa), as well as Senator Abdullahi Adamu, were on a sympathy visit when the incident happened.
The Ombatse killings happened when the militia members waylaid a detachment of police and SSS operatives sent to Alakyo, near Lafia, to arrest the cult leader following incidents on violence blamed on the group.
Dozens of policemen and 10 SSS men were killed, and most of the corpses burnt by the cultists.
The Nasarawa State Government has set up a Judicial Commission of Inquiry on the killings, with Justice Joseph Fola Gbadeyan as chairman. The panel suspended its sitting yesterday because of the visit by Sambo. It is due to continue taking submissions today.
Source; Daily Trust.