Below is a statement by the Zikist Movement on the threat to expel the Igbo ethnic group from Northern Nigeria.
The Zikist Movement wants to believe that Arewa Youths Consultative Forum (AYCF) and some other Northern youth groups were misquoted in reports that they threatened the lives and properties of Igbos residing in Northern Nigeria. However, if such statements were truly made, we ask them to quickly retract the implicating statements and retrace their steps.
Carrying out such threats will surely be counterproductive, given the existence of the International Criminal Court, and the international spread of activist Igbos and their friends all over the world.
Expelling a whole ethnic group from a region for no just cause is ethnic cleansing, which has been classified as a crime against humanity, and we remind the groups that unlike in 1966, today the International Criminal Court was formed to prosecute such occurrences.
We remind them that no single Nigerian socio cultural group can withstand the will of the international community if they decide to prosecute any case of ethnic cleansing. They should remember that all that is needed to get the ICJ to act on such if needed is movement of international public opinion galvanised by pictorial or other evidence.
As seen in recent instances, the Igbos and their friends clearly have the capability and willingness to move international public opinion in cases of unjust treatment. Igbos and their friends know how to capture such incidents with even the simplest of camera phones and share with the world.
We ask the AYCF and the other groups to ponder over what happened when Serbian ultra nationalists expelled Bosnian Muslims from parts of the former Yugoslavia. The world made sure all the ring leaders were punished severely.
We believe that should these groups carry out their threat,
