Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana,
has criticised the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration for clamping
down on individuals perceived as its critics.
Falana said this while insisting
that the planned protest march by the 2019 presidential aspirant of the African
Action Congress, AAC, Omoyele Sowore and some other individuals was not a
treasonable offence.
The activist lawyer’s claim is
following the arrest of Sowore by the Department of State Service, DSS.
Sowore had called for a nationwide staging of protests against what he
described as a bad governance.
The protest he tagged “Revolution
Now”, was planned to take place on Monday, August 5.
Following Sowore’s arrest, the
Nigerian Police Force, had described the planned protests by Sowore and some
individuals as ‘treasonable felony and acts of terrorism.’
It vowed to resist any act that
could lead to a breach of law and order in the country.
However, Falana, in a statement
he signed and issued on Sunday countered the claim of the police, saying the
Force had capitalized on the use of the word “revolution” to criminalise the
protests.
The statement reads: “No doubt,
the Nigeria Police Force has capitalized on the use of the word “revolution” to
criminalise the protests. If revolution has become a criminal offence in
Nigeria why were the leaders of the APC not charged for claiming to have
carried out Nigeria’s democratic revolution which terminated the 16-year rule
of the PDP in 2015?
“Why was Dr Kingsley Chiedu
Moghalu, the presidential candidate of the Young Progressive Party (YPP) not
threatened with treason when he asked Nigerians to rise up for revolution via
the 2019 general election?
“Did all Nigerian senators led by
APC members not commit treason or terrorism when they spent one and a half
hours on May 14, 2019 to debate Senator Chukwuka Utazi’s timely motion on
“Bridging the gap between the haves and have-not to nip in the bud the seeds of
a looming violent revolution?”
He noted that “it is worrisome
that the Buhari administration has decided to extend the ambit of the Terrorism
Prevention (Amendment) Act to cover individuals and organisations that are
critical of official policies or perceived marginalisation within the federation.”
Thabks for speaking us against this
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