The commission’s Executive Secretary, Tony Ojukwu, made this call at the #ENDSARS Judicial Panel Review Report Launch, held on Tuesday, in Abuja.
Ojukwu stressed the importance of compensating petitioners who suffered losses.
He said state governments should prioritise payment of victims and not wait for the Federal Government to make funds available before doing so.
“As a matter of urgency, state governments should set up Human Rights Committees that will deal with matters of human rights violations to forestall future occurrences that will trigger another #ENDSARS protest that will lead to human rights violations on a large scale,” Ojukwu said.
The Judicial Review Report looked at 29 states that established investigative panels of inquiry, using, Anambra, FCT, Lagos, and Oyo as focal states.
One of the researchers, Ikemesit Effiong, who spoke via Zoom, noted that most of the state panels were not independent and transparent.
He added that while some of the panels suffered insufficient funding, some others had to suspend their sitting which affected the effectiveness of the hearing.
The Chairman Human Rights Institute of the Nigerian Bar Association, Chinonye Obiagwu, who was a panelist at the event, disclosed that vulnerable people such as indigents and women constituted a large number of persons who brought petitions to the panel of Inquiry.
He lamented that there is a lack of political will by the government to deal with the petitions, a situation that he said had further emboldened policemen.
Speaking on the way forward, the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi, stated said the government has put in place an existing framework that will protect the rights of citizens.
Fagbemi, represented by the Secretary of the Federal Justice Sector Reform Coordinating Committee, Felix Ota-Okojie, called on all stakeholders to get involved in the implementation of the legal framework and extant laws of the country that protect the rights of citizens.
