For 19-year-old Terhile Jirbo, it was another answer to the call of nature. But when gunfire rang out that afternoon of March 18, what seemed a harmless routine would leave a fatal scar on him and his community in Gboko, a major town in the North-central state of Benue.
Members of Mbayion community in Gboko had responded after a soldier shot Mr. Jirbo for emptying his bowel near the Gboko Cement factory, the second most lucrative cement factory belonging to Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote. The attacker was one of two-dozen troops securing the multibillion-dollar factory.
In protest of the shooting, the community members marched outside the factory, and for hours, they asked for justice.
But as they hurled insults at the soldiers, asking them to leave the community, the troops responded with gunfire, according to state officials, witnesses, and community leaders.
Shot on the leg, one woman laid bloodied on the ground, and tried to crawl to safety. Then, a soldier closed up on her, pointed his rifle directly at her head and blasted, a witness said.
The woman’s brain matter splattered on another bullet-ridden victim, a man feigning death next to her. That man survived the attack even after a bullet ripped open his abdomen, spilling out his intestines.
When the shooting and the confusion subsided over three hours later, the death toll stood at seven – one woman, six men.
The victims – aged 36 and below – were all shot dead by troops of the Nigerian army, survivors and community members said.
By chance or fate, Mr. Jirbo, the teenager whose shooting by a soldier ignited the fracas, survived the attack. But he would be deformed for life, his mouth disfigured and emptied of almost all teeth in the upper region. A member of the more than two-dozen military team guarding the multibillion-dollar Gboko cement factory shot him in the mouth.
His offense: relieving himself near the Dangote factory complex, and refusing to pack the waste with his mouth when ordered to do so by the soldier.
In the outburst of violence that followed, the soldiers shot dead Doose Ornguze, 19, female; Luper Nongo Igber, 20, male; Timothy Terngu Mase, 21, male; Myom Mbaume, 25, male; Aondoyima Tyokase, 26, male; Iornenge Anum, 35, male and Aondoakura Tseeneke, 36, male.
They were killed in violation of their rights to life and human dignity as enshrined in Chapter Four of the Nigerian Constitution.
Eight others were seriously wounded in the attack, among them Thomas Igber, Sesugh Nongo, and Joseph Akpa Yaji.
Months of investigation by PREMIUM TIMES has shed light into a deadly violation of human rights perpetrated by state forces at a time Nigeria faces international scrutiny over human rights abuses in its war against suspected Boko Haram militants.
Community leaders spoke of how the Dangote group and the federal government brushed aside the killings, offered no assistance to the families of those killed or wounded by the troops. The government, also, has yet to punish or publicly identify those responsible for the massacre in the town.
While the military and the Dangote group confirmed the attack and the killings to Journalists , both have failed to impress the community on the steps they took to show sympathy, offer compensation to bereaved families or even help bury the dead.
Four months after the killings, that situation has remained the same despite repeated petitions by the community to the highest civilian and military authorities, including President Goodluck Jonathan, Senate President David Mark (an indigene of Benue State), and defence minister, Aliyu Gusau.
The Dangote group said it has reached out to the community since the killings, but did not state exactly what help it offered, and whether or not the offer was accepted.
But Sebastian Hon, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and an indigene of the community punctured that claim. “We wrote to Dangote about the killing of our youth since March but he has not found it expedient to reply the letter,” Mr. Hon said. “He never offered any assistance towards the treatment of the youth who sustained gunshot injuries or contribute to the burial of the seven youth who were killed.”
The community said it decided to bear the cost of autopsy on the victims, their embalmment and burial on behalf of the affected families, after help failed to come from the company whose guards killed them.
Army officials and witnesses said after the shooting of Mr. Jirbo – the man wounded in the mouth – the commander of the army unit on duty rounded up the soldier who shot him, disarmed him, seized his belt and beret and secured him in a guard room.
The army would not say what has happened to the soldier, or other soldiers who later opened fire on protesters, killing seven.
A spokesperson for the army, Olajide Olaleye, a Brigadier General, said that investigations into the incident “are continuing”.
