According to report reaching oyogist.com, reactions from United States’ report on the much-talked-about Lekki ‘massacre’ have been so few because it disappointed those who had hoped America would endorse their claim that there was indeed a massacre at the Lekki Toll Gate venue of the #EndSARS protest on October 20, 2020. Apart from Mr Femi Falana, Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), and Amnesty International (AI), that have been loud in criticising the report, all appears relatively quiet since it was made public on March 31. America must have disappointed quite a number of people, including the Cable News Network (CNN), which had earlier reported a lot of killings at the venue.
But, rather than confirm that there was any masacre, the American report would seem to agree that if there was any massacre, it was one without bodies. Indeed, that report by the United States Department of State, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour on the incident said there was no accurate information on the incident. It said soldiers merely shot into the air to disperse the protesters who had been infiltrated by hoodlums who wanted to seize the opportunity to wreak havoc. The 45th annual human rights report, said “accurate information on the fatalities” from the shooting remained fuzzy, noting that apart from ”Amnesty International which reported 10 persons died during the event, no other organization was able to verify the claim.”
“One body from the toll gate showed signs of blunt force trauma. A second body from another location in Lagos State had bullet wounds. The government acknowledged that soldiers armed with live ammunition were present at the Lekki Toll Gate. At year’s end the Lagos State Judicial Panel of Inquiry and Restitution continued to hear testimony and investigate the shooting at Lekki Toll Gate,” the report noted.
Amnesty International Nigeria’s chief Osai Ojigho said the testimonies of witnesses at the Lekki Toll Gate corroborated some people’s claim that soldiers fired live bullets at demonstrators as against claims of firing blank bullets in the air. Insisting that it stood by its initial claim, AI said : “Amnesty International had asked for independent and transparent investigations into what really happened at the Lekki Toll Gate and we still haven’t seen that and that is what is really worrisome, especially because a lot of people will not be able to move on until justice is served.” The body added: “There have been other reports by other organisations and also shared on social media attesting to the fact that different people who were located at the Lekki Toll Gate at the time of the incident were reportedly killed.”
Falana, on the other hand, is angry that the media is helping the United States to treat Nigerians like colonial subjects due to the perceived positive coverage of the report by the media. “Do soldiers shoot into the air to enforce curfew in the United States?” Falana queried, in response to the military’s claim in that regard. Not done, the SAN added: “How can the United States Government be allowed to treat the proceedings before a properly constituted Judicial Panel of Inquiry so contemptuously? The report is prejudicial in every material particular. It should be ignored by the judicial panel as it is designed to pre-empt the evidence being adduced by the survivors of the barbaric attack.”
