Madame Michelle Bachelet Jeria
Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Palais Wilson
52 Rue des Paquis
CH-1201 Geneva, Switzerland
27 January 2022
Dear Madam High Commissioner
Re: Sheikh Ibrahim Zakzaky and Mallimah Zakzaky
I am writing to urge your intervention to help secure necessary travel documents for the leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria, Sheikh Ibrahim el-Zakzaky, and his spouse Mallimah Zeenah, from the country’s authorities.
Since the pair were released from illegal detention last July, they have been prevented from flying abroad to seek much needed medical treatment by Nigerian authorities who continue to refuse to return their passports.
The couple are taking legal action seeking the restoration of their passports but face stalling tactics from the government which seems determined to deny them the freedom of movement that is their constitutional right.
It is not disputed that the specialist treatment the Zakzakys need is not available in Nigeria.
Sheikh Zakzaky has lead poisoning after sustaining four gunshot injuries during the 2015 massacre of Islamic Movement of Nigeria members and supporters by the country’s armed forces. The toxicity is believed to be a direct result of the shrapnel from bullets left in his body. The sheikh has also lost sight in one eye and the use of one arm and has suffered several strokes.
Mallimah Zeenah is also seriously ill with high blood pressure and can barely walk because of a bullet trapped near her spine.
Their ongoing maltreatment, and the endless adjournment of court hearings, supports the view that after wrongly incarcerating the couple for over five years the Nigerian authorities are continuing their witchhunt against the couple and abusing the judicial system to keep them in Nigeria in the hope that they will die quietly.
The case of the Zakzakys is making a mockery of rule of law and due process. At every stage of their ordeal the Nigerian government has flagrantly flouted the country’s laws and its citizens’ fundamental rights with impunity.
We urge you to do everything in your power to impress upon the Nigerian government the wrongfulness of their actions, the importance of upholding the country’s constitutional and internationally agreed human rights and the medical urgency to restore the Zakzakys’ passports.
Yours sincerely
Massoud Shadjareh
Chair
Islamic Human Rights Commission
cc. Mary Lawlor, special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders
Mr. Clement Nyaletsossi Voule, special rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly
Mr. Stephen Kaye, special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression
