The police in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have apprehended some officials of the Catholic church in Abuja over the stampede that killed 10 people during the distribution of food items at the weekend.
According to Daily Trust, all those who were arrested on Monday morning have been taken into detention.
The arrests came against the background of demands by the Islamic activist group, Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) for the arrest of those behind the event and a similar one in Okija, Anambra State, where 22 persons were confirmed dead in a billionaire businessman’s house.
MURIC had demanded that organisers of a similar tragic charity event in Ibadan, Oyo State, who were taken to court and remanded in prison custody, should be released if those of the Abuja and Anambra events would not be given similar treatment.
Reacting to the arrest and detention of his church officials last night, the Catholic Archbishop of Abuja Diocese, Most Rev Ignatius Kaigama, condemned what he described as “verbal demonization of the Catholic Church” by some agents of government in responding to the tragedy at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Maitama.
According to Kaigama, the detention of the priest as well as some officials of the church and the threat to slam criminal charges on the church “is, to say the least, uninspiring, unfriendly and a misplaced zeal, and one wonders what purpose these were meant to serve.”
Speaking via a Christmas message titled Christmas: A Season of Hope and Renewal”, the Archbishop advised government to focus on helping the organisers and the church to overcome their trauma instead of compounding it through arrest, detention and threat of criminal prosecution.
However, speaking to the aforementioned publication, the spokeswoman of the FCT police command, SP Adeh Josephine, disclosed that some key individuals involved in organising the distribution of palliatives who were invited for questioning were later allowed to go home
She said the step was taken for a better understanding of the circumstances that led to the unfortunate stampede incident.
“An invitation regarding a tragedy of this magnitude is not out of place. We are addressing the loss of human lives, which, in religious and moral belief, are sacred,” she said.