A member of the Lagos panel
constituted to probe the Lekki shootings of October 20, 2020, Ebun-Olu
Adegboruwa (SAN), has said that the EndSARS panels set up by state governments
across the country are legal and can probe the brutality and extrajudicial killings
committed by members of the Nigeria Police Force and the Nigerian Army.
The senior advocate said the
judicial panels were set up at the behest of the Federal Government, through
the National Economic Council, and so, cannot be termed illegal because the
findings of some of the panels aren’t in favour of the regime of the President,
Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.).
The Minister of State for Labour
and Employment, Festus Keyamo (SAN), on Sunday, had dismissed the EndSARS panel
set up by the Lagos State Government and the report it presented to the state
government recently.
Keyamo had said the panel was
illegal because it was out of the jurisdiction of the panel to investigate the
activities of Federal Government institutions and officials such as the Police
and the Army.
But in a statement on Monday
titled, ‘The Legality Of #EndSARS Panels’, Adegboruwa said, “The Federal
Government has recently muted the idea that all the Judicial Panels of Inquiry
set up by the various States across the Federation, especially that of Lagos
State, are illegal.
“It has never been part of our
legal system in Nigeria, for a plaintiff who approached the court in the first
instance, to turn around to challenge the legality or jurisdiction of the
court.
“The EndSARS Panels were set up
at the behest of the Federal Government, through the National Economic Council.
In the case of the Lagos Panel, the federal government, through the Nigerian
Army, voluntarily submitted itself to the jurisdiction of the Panel, the federal
government called witnesses, it tendered documents and it made very lengthy
presentations.
“A party cannot approbate and
reprobate at the same time. Thus, a party who initiated a process and willingly
and actively participated in that process, cannot turn around, after judgment,
to plead illegality or absence of jurisdiction, simply because the outcome is
unfavourable. We must strengthen our institutions to make them work.
“While we all await the White
Paper from the Lagos State Government, it is important for government to build
trust in the people in all its dealings and utterances.”
The Justice Doris Okuwobi-led
panel on November 15, 2021, submitted its report to the Lagos State Government,
noting that at least nine persons were confirmed dead at the Lekki toll plaza
when soldiers stormed the tollgate to disperse EndSARS protesters on October
20, 2020.
The 309-page leaked report
stated, “The atrocious maiming and killing of unarmed, helpless and unresisting
protesters while sitting on the floor and waving their Nigerian flags and while
singing the National Anthem can be equated to a massacre in context.”
Lagos State Governor, Babajide
Sanwo-Olu, who received the report, said he had constituted a Committee to
bring forward a White Paper within the next two weeks to be considered by the
Lagos State Executive Council.
United States Secretary of State,
Antony Blinken, on a two-day official visit to Nigeria recently, had said that
the submission of the report by the Lagos panel was an important step towards
accountability for killings and rights abuses allegedly committed by soldiers
and policemen.
Blinken had met with the Nigerian
President at Aso Rock in Abuja, and Buhari had said the Federal Government was
waiting on Lagos State and other state governments to come up with their
conclusions.
But Minister of Information and
Culture, Lai Mohammed subsequently said, “It is simply incredible that a
judicial panel set up to investigate an incident has submitted a report laden
with allegations, the same allegations it was set up to investigate in the
first instance.
“Instead of sitting for all of
one year, the panel could have just compiled social media tales by the
moonlight on the incident and submitted, saving taxpayers’ funds and everyone’s
time. That report is nothing but the triumph of fake news and the intimidation
of a silent majority by a vociferous lynch mob.”
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com