Rights groups say Muslim activists persecuted

Nigerian human rights groups have accused the outgoing military government of persecuting militants of the Islamic Brotherhood, a group led by Muslim cleric Ibrahim El-Zak Zaky. Fabian Okoye, the director of publications of Human Rights Monitor - an NGO that has interviewed Zaky extensively - told IRIN on Monday the Brotherhood had been denied freedom to express its views on the government and had had its processions broken up illegally, while scores of Zaky's followers were still being detained. Human Rights Monitor claims Zaky was freed - last year - only after it exerted considerable pressure on government, which could not be reached for comment. "Since Zaky was released then the others should be freed," Okoye said. It was a question of collective justice, he added. University authorities at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, have banned Zaky from praying at the Congo Campus mosque, where he had worshipped for the past 25 years, according to Okoye. Zaky, Okoye said, felt that corruption and "an ungodly leadership" formed the nexus of Nigeria's problem, which only an Islamic government could change. Advocating this system of government for Nigeria, drawing inspiration from Iran, was a direct challenge to state authority Okoye said, "so, government was treating that as an act of subversion." Half of Nigeria's estimated 107 million people are Muslims, who live mainly in the north.