Tension in Kano over killing of Shi’ia leader
Sheik Muhammad Turi, a leader of the Shi’ia sect in Kano, has been
confirmed killed in Zaria following a clash between the sect and the
military over the weekend. Turi’s killing has sparked tension in Kano,
as members of the sect staged a rally from Saturday night till about 4am
on Sunday. A second rally held on Sunday around Fagged Mosque,
popularly known as ‘Waje Mosque’. According to a Kano resident, tens of thousands of Shi’ia members trooped to the nooks
and crannies of Kano, passing through the palace of the emir of Kano,
Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi II, and raining expletives on the military
personnel attached to Tukur Buratai, chief of army staff. Yusuf Aliyum, a
Shi’ia member who participated in the nocturnal protest, told TheCable
that every member of the sect was prepared to fight to his last drop.
According to him, members of the sect had remained peaceful and
diplomatic in all their approach so far, and there was no justification
for an attack on them. Another member of the sect, who did not want to
be named, criticised the “provocation by the military personnel attached
to Buratai’s convoy”. “Our members should take into cognizance, the
fact that we were defenceless. The military personnel attached to the
convoy were heavily armed to the teeth. we lacked the capability to
fight them back,” he said. “In Zaria, we suffered a similar tragedy last
year when three of the children of our leader, Sheikh El- Zazzaky, were
killed. Since that time. nothing was done to call the perpetrators of
the cruel act to order. “We have no reason to act in the way we acted on
Saturday, even though we were the ones provoked. We should have trod
the path of diplomacy, not confrontation, in achieving our goal. To me,
the clash was most unfortunate.” Till date, the ongoing insurgency in
the north-east is blamed on a similar clash between Boko Haram and the
military, culminating in the 2009 summary execution of Mohammed Yusuf,
the sect’s leader
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