SSS arrests 2 Nigerian journalists and their wives
In a move reminiscent of the dark days of military dictatorship, the agents of the SSS, in pre-dawn raids, picked up the editor of Almizan, Musa Muhammad Awwal, and reporter Aliyu Saleh, along with their wives.
Saleh’s son was also arrested, according to the weekly’s editor-in-chief Ibrahim Musa.
The arrests occurred in Kaduna, where the regional newspaper has an office.
Their wives and the son were released later Monday, Musa told the French news agency.
“Armed men from the SSS accompanied by soldiers broke into the homes of our editor … and reporter … around 4:00 am today and took them away along with their two wives and the son of the reporter after manhandling them,” Musa said.
“We believe their arrest was in connection with a story we published in our latest edition on the arrests of 84 people in the town of Potiskum in Yobe state by soldiers on suspicion of belonging to Boko Haram sect and denying their families access to them.”
During the raid, SSS officials took away laptops and mobile phones from the journalists’ homes, he said.
Secret police officials did not respond to phone calls.
Almizan, established in 1991 and published in the Hausa language spoken throughout Nigeria’s north, is run by the Shiite and pro-Iranian Islamic Movement of Nigeria.
Residents and human rights bodies have accused troops of abuses, including arbitrary arrests and killings of civilians, in connection with Boko Haram’s insurgency in Nigeria’s northern and central regions.
Amnesty International on 1 November released a report on the various abuses by the army against Nigerians in the name of the war against Boko Haram.
“People in Nigeria are facing human rights violations at the hands of the state security forces mandated with their protection”, it said in the report titled: Nigeria: trapped in a cycle of violence.
The report exposed the Nigerian government’s failure to protect the population and prevent the campaign of violence led by Boko Haram across northern and central Nigeria,” the statement said.
The report was vehemently denied by the Nigerian army authorities.
As if to demonstrate the inaccuracy of reports about the Nigerian military operations, Reuters apologized over a video of the atrocities, the content of which the news agency found was doctored.
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