“Over 200 people have been killed in communal and sectarian violence in Plateau State since 24 December 2010 ... Yet the Nigerian authorities have failed to bring suspected perpetrators to justice”, the global rights watchdog said in its March report.
It said that more than 2,000 people had been killed in the volatile state since 1994 “in repeated cycles of violence”.
Nigeria holds presidential and general elections next month and the political environment is “very tense”, it said.
“In the run-up to the elections, the country has seen an increase in violence”, it stated.
Only 17 people have been convicted while 63 people have been charged over the violence and murders in Plateau State since last year.
It said several hundred people had been killed in politically-motivated, communal and sectarian violence across Nigeria in the past six months, while human rights activists and journalists faced increasing intimidation and harassment.
“After each crisis the federal and state authorities have failed to take adequate measures to prevent future violent clashes and to protect the life of individuals”, it said.
Amnesty said Nigerian officials had failed to take adequate steps to investigate the killings.
“Nigeria has a weak criminal justice system. It is under-resourced, blighted by corruption and struggles to earn the trust of the population”, said the report.
“The flaw in criminal justice contributes to the culture of impunity that exists in the country for violence, including politically-motivated violence”, Amnesty indicated, adding that the police lacked the resources to investigate complex crimes that require specialised skills.
It also said that a government prosecutor in Plateau State attributed delay in prosecution to poor investigation by the police but a national police spokesman denied this.
“We have skill and resources to handle any case, be it criminal or civil”, Femi Ajayi said.
“Conviction in any case depends on the availability of overwhelming evidence. We rely on people to give us evidence and delays in prosecution could be caused by paucity of evidence supplied to the police”, he said. n
Amnesty said that Nigerian authorities and the Independent National Electoral Commission must prevent a repetition of the political violence that characterised the 2007 and 2003 elections.
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