Kaduna SSG tells panel how 347 bodies got mass burial

• Zakzaky was funded by Iran, his brother says

The Judicial Commission of Inquiry set up in Kaduna State in the aftermath of the December 12 clash between Shiites also called Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) and soldiers in Zaria, was yesterday told that no fewer than 347 unidentified bodies were given mass burial in Kaduna.

Secretary to the Kaduna State Government, (SSG), Balarabe Abbas Lawal who made this known while appearing before the commission said the bodies were given a mass burial on 14 December, along Mando – Zaria road.

He said a total of 191 unknown corpse and another 156 unknown corpses from the Army depot in Zaria and Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, ABUTH, Shika respectively were conveyed to the burial site.

Lawal also told the panel that the Gyelasu resident of the leader of Shiites and two other houses owned by Alhaji Aminu Idris and Alhaji Tijjani Mohammed were demolished on ground of safety and not out of any ulterior or political reasons.

In a related development, Muhammad Sani Yaqoob an elder brother to the leader of the Shiites , Sheikh Ibraheem El-Zakyzaky, told the panel his brother’s sect was funded by Iran.

He also commended the action of the military against the Shittes during the bloody clash with soldiers in Zaria, insisting that the Nigerian Army would have been the worse for it if the soldiers had turned back on the spot of the Zaria clash where the Shiites barricaded the convoy of the Chief of Army Staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai.

Yaqoob who spoke in Hausa told the judicial panel that he shared the same father with El-Zakzaky, but different mothers, pointing out that there was no clash between him and El-Zakzaky while growing up except that he has different ideology.

He argued that “ El-Zakzaky is fourth child in the family of 16”, describing him as very sharp and intelligent.