No fewer than 42 members of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) have been arrested by the police over a procession in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
Since their leader Ibraheem El-Zakzaky was detained in 2015, IMN Shiites have been at loggerheads with the Nigerian government. But El-Zakzaky was recently released.
The FCT police spokesperson, DSP Josephine Adeh, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that some of the members came from Niger, Bauchi, Gombe, Borno and Kaduna states to “cause mayhem in the FCT.”
She said that the suspects, carrying charms, stones and some minor explosives were nabbed at the Kubwa-Gwarimpa axis of Abuja.
She claimed that they stormed the area in large numbers, obstructing traffic and throwing stones and explosives at police operatives.
The police operatives had been able to disperse the protesters and brought the situation under control, and no casualty was recorded but some of the protesters sustained injuries, she revealed.
Soldiers had earlier beaten up some female IMN members along the Abuja-Kaduna expressway in the nation’s capital on Tuesday
Soldiers, who mounted strategic location on the ever-busy road, had flagged the vehicle conveying the women.
The women, who were flogged and kicked by the soldiers immediately they alighted, were later whisked into a van parked by the road.
Eyewitnesses at the scene also saw the security operatives harassing passengers and passersby.
The soldiers searched the vehicles in the bid to identify IMN Shiites.
“Come out now! You are one of them!” a well-built armed soldier barked at a man in one of the buses, according to witnesses.
A lady said she and two other members of her family were on their way to Jabi Motor Park when the passengers on the bus conveying them were forced out of the bus, Daily trust reported.
