“According to an exclusive report by SaharaReporters, seven years after her five children were killed by the Nigerian army, a female member of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN), Safiya Usman, is dead.
SaharaReporters gathered that Safiya died at a hospital in Kano on Thursday.
A family source said the deceased was rushed to the hospital after she collapsed on Wednesday in her hometown of Bargi, Tudun Wadar DanKadai in Kano.
She was said to have been battling hypertension since the Zaria massacre of December 2015 when the military killed over 300 Shiites in Kaduna.
Apart from losing five of her children, six other family members of hers were also killed by the soldiers.
Safiya’s children killed were Shahid Ishaq Ibrahim, Martyr Sani Ibrahim, Martyr Usman Ibrahim, Shahid Abdullahi Ibrahim and Martyr Mukhtar Ibrahim.
“The military also assassinated her two younger siblings, two grandchildren, and one son-in-law. They were all killed during the Zaria massacre.
“She collapsed in her town of Bargi, Tudun Wadar DanKadai in Kano, where she was taken to a hospital. After doing a few tests on her she gave up the ghost, she has since been buried,” a family member told SaharaReporters.
From December 12 to 14, 2015, hundreds of Shia Muslim members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) were killed by Nigerian soldiers in a massacre condemned by local and international rights groups.
At least 348 civilians were reportedly killed, with 347 bodies allegedly secretly buried by the army in a mass grave.
Kaduna State government in April 2016 said 347 corpses were given a mass burial at the Mando cemetery after what they claimed was a clash between soldiers and members of the Shiite sect in the state.
The Secretary to the Kaduna State Government, Mallam Balarabe Lawal, who said this when he appeared before a Judicial Commission of Inquiry, added that the corpses were given a mass burial in a grave on December 14, 2015, in a cemetery along Mando/ Zaria Road.
According to the SSG, a total of 191 unknown corpses were recovered from the Army Depot in Zaria and another batch of 156 corpses was recovered from the Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Shika.
No soldier or official was prosecuted for the mass murder.
The attacks were never condemned by the army hierarchy or the Muhammadu Buhari administration.
After his initial silence, Buhari later suggested during a televised interview on December 30, 2015, that the victims invited the wrath of the military upon themselves by “hitting the chest of generals”.
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