Nigerian Human rights activist, Femi Falana has lashed out at President, Muhammadu Buhari for attempting to stifle the rights of the people to walk the streets in protests.
Against the backdrop of the Commissioner of Police in Lagos State, Hakeem Odumosu, restricting people of Lagos from taking to the streets to mark the one-year anniversary of the #EndSARS protest, Falan has bashed the government for being inconsistent.
Falana reacting to the news, intimated that Buhari was a chief protester in his days in the opposition parties when he had not become president so he would be deemed a hypocrite if he allows the police to sit on the rights of protesters.
He said: “It is public knowledge that General Muhammadu Buhari (as he then was) and other leaders of the ruling All Progressive Congress took part in public rallies against fuel hike in January 2012 and protests against insecurity in November 2014.
“To that extent, the Buhari administration ought to restrain the Police from banning peaceful rallies against police brutality on October 20, 2021 in any manner whatsoever and however.”
“The threats against peaceful rallies oozing out of the police headquarters and state commands are illegal as they constitute a gross infringement of the fundamental rights of the Nigerian people to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly guaranteed by Sections 38 and 40 of the Nigerian Constitution as well as Articles 9 and 10 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights Act,”
“The appeal of the police against the judgment was dismissed by the Court of Appeal in December 2007. In the unanimous decision of the court, their lordships described police permit as ‘a relic of colonialism’ which is anomalous in a democratic society,
