Zaria Massacre: Shiite Group Releases Own Video, Claims Attack was Planned by Nigerian Army (Video)

Ibrahim El-Zakzaky 

The Shi’ite group, led by Ibrahim El-Zakzaky, the Islamic Movement of Nigeria, has stated that the December 12 and 13 attacks on its members by soldiers of the Nigerian Army was deliberate and planned.


More than 300 members of the sect are believed to have been killed in the Zaria attack, which the army initially described as an assassination attempt on the Chief of Army Staff, Turkur Buratai, a General.


The military later released an edited video showing a group of angry youth with sticks and cutlasses arguing with some army brass over the right of way for the convoy of Mr Buratai.

The whereabout of the sect’s leader, Mr. Zakzaky, who was reportedly shot four times during the attack, is still unknown. The Kaduna State government said it would set up a judicial panel of inquiry to investigate the killing.

In an apparent move to counter the military’s narrative, the Shi’ite group posted a video on YouTube purportedly showing the attack. The narrator of the 22:36-minute edited video, which is delivered in Hausa but subtitled in English, said the attack on the sect was unprovoked.

He said the sect members were preparing for the change of the Maulud flag when they saw soldiers stationing themselves near a NNPC filling station directly opposite the sect’s enclave, Husainiyya, and dropping boxes of ammunition.

The narrator explained that the military lied when it claimed that Mr. Buratai’s convoy was denied the right of way. He said in the past, soldiers and military convoys passed through their processions and gatherings unhindered. He said the sect only approached Mr. Buratai’s convoy to tell the soldiers to move further away with their weapon to avoid an occurrence of the 2014 incident where a traffic argument with a group of soldiers led to the killing of 34 members of the sect, among them three sons of Mr Zakzaky.

“We asked them to move forward with their weapons due to the 2014 incident where 34 members were killed,” the narrator said. The narrator claimed instead soldiers spread themselves out around the nearby polo ground encircling the Husainiyya as if in a war front.

The narrator alleged that it was at the point of trying to placate the soldiers that the soldiers started firing on them. PREMIUM TIMES could not independently verify the footage which was apparently shot with a mobile phone, but soldiers with assault rifles could be clearly seen encircling the Husainiyya and taking shooting positions.

Sounds of intermittent gunfire could be heard as the sect members laid on their stomachs and other hid behind trees to avoid being hit by bullets. Some of the youth could be heard screaming Allahu Akbar, Arabic for God is great. The narrator explained that the Shi’ite members ran to the Husainiyya for refuge from bullets. The footage later showed soldiers dragging the bodies of those shot into a truck.

The narrator claimed the soldiers took the bodies away.

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