– A fighter jet belonging to the Nigerian Air Force recently bombed a camp for internally displaced persons in Borno state
– About nine different rights organisations have secured the assistance Femi Falana to sue the federal government and the Nigerian Air Force
Just days after an aircraft belonging to the Nigeria Air Force allegedly mistakenly bombed an internally displaced person’s camp in Rann, Borno state killing scores of victims of the Boko Haram insurgents, nine rights groups have sued the federal government.
The camp was hit by bombs from a fight jet belonging to the Nigerian Air Force
The Punch reports that the Centre for Women, Youth and Community Action; the Civil Society Coalition on Transparency, Accountability and Good Governance; the Justice and Rights Initiative; Campaign for Democracy; and the International Centre for Peace Charities and Human Development, which are some of the rights organisations, also sued the Nigerian Air Force.
So far, a total of 234 people are said to have died from the bombing that occurred on January 17, 2017, while many are still nursing injuries.
President Muhammadu Buhari had condemned the bombing of the camp while a panel was raised to investigate the circumstances that surrounded the incident.
In view of this, the Human Rights Watch also called on the Federal Government to compensate the victims.
READ ALSO: HRW releases satellite images of the bombing of Rann IDP camp by Nigerian Airforce
It was learnt that a human rights lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Femi Falana, will be handling the case for the groups free of any charge.
The report quoted Falana as saying: “I will be willing to take up the matter pro bono. We have to start by establishing how many people were killed.
“The NAF gave a casualty figure of less than 60, whereas 236 bodies have been buried. Second, we shall find out whether the incident was an accident or sabotage.”
On his part, the executive director of the Centre for Women, Youth and Community Action, Nawani Aboki, said: “We are planning to write a petition to the federal government so that compensations would be paid and it will be done with the support of the international community because when you talk locally, government doesn’t take it seriously, unlike when the international bodies are involved in the process.
“We are starting with the petition and we will take it up to the level of the United Nations to let the international community know what is happening in Nigeria and to compel the government to pay compensations to all those who were killed.
“The first step is to determine the total number of people that died. People are talking from uninformed perspectives. How many people have died as a result of the bombing? Based on that, we will be able to assess how much compensation we can demand.
“If we say N500bn, but we find out so many people have died, what do you do? So we need to set up a team to determine the number of people who actually died as a result of the bombing, after which we would now look at how much should be paid as compensation to the various families.”
Speaking also, the president of the Campaign for Democracy, Mr. Bako Abdul Usman, said the organisations are asking for N500 billion as compensation for the victims.
READ ALSO: UN commends President Buhari’s reaction on Rann IDP camp bombing
“We stand with the downtrodden people, and that is the principal ideology in setting up Campaign for Democracy.
“So, we demand that something should be done speedily, in terms of compensation, to cushion the pain on those who lost their loved ones. We are interested in suing the government and we believe N500bn is worth it,” he said.
360naze
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