President Bola Tinubu has been urged to extend the same reprieve granted to 114 #EndBadGovernance protesters, including minors to others currently on trial. Some are still in detention for failing to meet their stringent bail conditions.
In September, the government arraigned several #EndBadGovernance protesters, including Adaramoye Michael Lenin, Mosiu Sodiq, Daniel Akande, Angel Love Innocent, Adeyemi Abayomi, Buhari Lawal, Bashir Bello, Suleiman Yakubu, Opaoluwa Eleojo Simon, Nuradeen Khamis and Abdulsalami Zubairu. The protesters are expected in court again on November 8 for their prosecution on charges of treason which carries the death penalty.
Last Friday, a fresh set of #EndBadGovernance protesters were arraigned in court, including 32 children. Their arraignment elicited local and international uproar after it emerged that the minors had been in police facilities for nearly 100 days without enough food and medical care. The presiding judge also added to the woes of the children by slamming N10m bail on each of them. The combined embarrassment caused the federal government to hurriedly drop all charges against the minors, including the other #EndBadGovernance protesters arraigned in court with the children.
However, the first set of protesters including Adaramoye Michael Lenin and 10 others arraigned in court on September 2 were not included in the acquittal.
On Wednesday, November 6, the Organizing Committee of the #EndBadGovernance Movement in Lagos addressed a press conference where they demanded the dropping of charges against all the remaining protesters in detention and on trial.
Hassan Taiwo Soweto who read the texts of the press statement, argued that the release of the 114 protesters, including 32 children was not a product of Tinubu’s magnanimity. He said it was because of the fear of the Nigerian people’s anger as well as the local and global outrage the situation generated due to the relentless campaign of groups and organizations who subjected the regime to blistering criticism.
He added: “Left to the despotic Tinubu regime, the children would not be released. This is because the arrest and arraignment of the children for terrorism and treason was an important part of the Tinubu regime’s toolkit of intimidation tactics aimed at striking fear into the heart of the Nigerian populace and anyone who dares to oppose its anti-poor policies.”
Soweto said since the charges against the discharged 114 protesters are broadly similar to the ones levelled against Adaramoye Michael Lenin and 10 others, the government should also let them go, especially because the charges against them are ridiculous with weak proof of evidence. For instance, he said Adaramoye Michael Lenin was arrested because of his Russian nickname, Lenin which he adopted after Vladimir Ilich Lenin, the leader of the 1917 Socialist Revolution in Russia.
According to Soweto, the Inspector General of Police Kayode Egbetokun and National Security Adviser Nuhu Ribadu, had convinced Tinubu that Russia was behind the protest against him, not hunger, hence, the arrest of Adaramoye Michael Lenin to justify the theory since he had Russian name.
Soweto said the Russian Revolution of 1917 which inspired Adaramoye Michael to adopt Lenin as a moniker, is sharply in contrast to current capitalist Russia under Vladimir Putin which Adaramoye Michael Lenin opposes.
The group also demanded the sack of police boss Egbetokun for the incarceration of children for nearly 100 days and subjecting them to torture and starvation.
They also demanded the composition of an independent probe panel of elected representatives of civil society organisations, trade unions and professional groups to investigate the circumstances surrounding the children’s ordeal to identify government and security officials that are directly responsible for their ill-treatment so that they can be appropriately sanctioned.
In her response, child rights activist and founder of CEE-HOPE, Betty Abah, quoted the late South African leader Nelson Mandela’s words to express her disgust with the treatment of the children. Mandela had said: “There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.”
Abah added: “We are not a child-friendly country. Children detained in adult facilities and arraigned without protection for their privacy, starved and tortured.”
Abah said it was even more traumatizing to hear counsel to the government calling the children boys and mature men in the same sentence. She also said IGP said very inciting things about the children for which she is very disappointed in him.
Another speaker at the event, Blessing Osugba wondered how Nobel Laureate Professor Wole Soyinka who led a protest against the then-President Goodluck Jonathan when things were relatively okay could lose his voice at a time when Nigerians are in worse shape.
She urged Nigerians to unite and protest until Tinubu reverses the policies that have pushed them into an economic crisis.
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