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HURIWA Demands Gov Bala’s Immediate Arrest

Published

4 years ago

Feb 13, 2021.

Human Rights Writers Association of Nigerians (HURIWA) has asked for the arrest of Bauchi State Governor, Bala Mohammed for publicly supporting captured herders carrying AK47.

HURIWA said the police and the Department of State Services (DSS) should immediately arrest the governor instead of clampdown and arresting protesters at the controversial Lekki toll gate.

Ekohotblog gathered that the group accused the Federal Government of; “double standards and gross violations of human rights of protesting citizens who are law-abiding and peaceful threatens constitutional democracy.”

HURIWA compares the current administration’s attacks of peaceful protesters in the Lekki toll gate and in almost the entire peaceful marches by citizens for the last 6 years to the military junta in Myanmar.

It said the Muhammadu Buhari-led administration is increasingly becoming: “dictatorial and totalitarian which goes against the Nigerian Constitution upon which basis they were elected democratically by Nigerians who are the owners of the sovereignty of Nigeria and only donated the legitimacy to the administration to exercise authority within the bounds of the Constitution.”

HURIWA said the public demonstrations are democratic ways of passing on information of existing grievances to the elected leaders, adding that any attempt to suppress democratic freedoms of expression and peaceful Assembly is a Coup against democracy and the Constitution.

In a statement issued by the National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Media Affairs Director Miss Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA said the crackdown on peaceful protesters in Lekki toll gate on Saturday is a grave affront to the core principles and values of constitutionalism and democracy.

HURIWA warned that the action of the Lagos State police command could motivate activists from across the Country to pour out on the streets to carry out solidarity march.

It said the action of the Police by arresting citizens turning out for peaceful demonstration is a violation of chapter 4 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria of 1999 as amended with particular reference to the provisions safeguarding the fundamental human rights of Citizens which are universal and inalienable.

HURIWA said the: “brutal arrests of these activists by the police under the command and control of Mohammed Adamu who is occupying the office of the Inspector General of police illegally after he has gone past his disengagement period in line with the extant police Act of 2020, is an action that offends all known international human rights conventions, treaties endorsed by the Nigerian State and domesticated by the municipal law and the Grund Norm of Nigeria even as the group threatened to petition global leaders including President Joe Biden of the United States of America”.

The group affirmed also that section 39 of the Constitution on the other hand provides that: “(1) every person shall be entitled to freedom of expression, including freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information without interference.

HURIWA asserts that section 40 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria provides thus: “Every person shall be entitled to assemble freely and associate with other persons, and in particular he may form or belong to any political party, trade union or any other association for the protection of his interests:Provided that the provisions of this section shall not derogate from the powers conferred by this Constitution on the Independent National Electoral Commission with respect to political parties to which that Commission does not accord recognition.”

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