The group said it believed the attacks were strongly linked to subversive agents of the retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari-led “intolerant and grossly rights abusive” government.
In a statement on Friday, InterSociety said its website had been shut down at least five times and attacked with the trojan virus or others 50 times, forcing the organisation to spend a fortune on clearing the mess and retrieving the advocacy files on its website.
“The shutting down of our website for weeks or days has occurred in 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022 and Tuesday, 4th April 2023. The website had also suffered not less than 50 virus attacks since then, an average of ten severe virus attacks per year.
The latest shutdown of our website occurred on Tuesday, 4th April 2023 and on enquiry, we were informed in writing by our domain host that ‘our website hosting has been suspended as a result of numerous complaints and petitions against the site, and this report and majority of the petitions are from your region (Nigeria)’…” the statement read.
The CSO said its investigations revealed that the attackers were agents of the outgoing government, adding that it remained an outstanding voice against rights abuse in the country, and was older than the current government
“Our further investigations following the shutdowns revealed that they secretly emanated from the subversive agents of the outgoing Government of Nigeria located in the military, spy police and cyber and general information departments and ministries.
For the purpose of setting the record straight, Intersociety is a highly knowledgeable human rights, democracy, rule of law and citizens’ security and safety advocacy Organization. We are also seven years older than the outgoing Federal Government of Nigeria, having been formed in July 2008 as against the outgoing Nigerian Government which came on board in late May 2015”.
The group also faulted the endorsement of and “protectors” of the government in spite of various allegations of human rights abuse which have led some leaders to be summoned to the Hague, New York, Geneva, Brussels and Paris, to defend themselves
They added that the regime had also seen the registration of more than 360 pro-government-sponsored groups registered since 2015, with further checks showing that the number of such “leprous government NGOs” had increased to about 600 as at end of 2022.
Intersociety further called for intervention into government ownership and censorship of civil society organisations, adding that all hands must be on deck to save organizations like the Amnesty International-Nigeria and the African Nigerian Section of the Human Rights Watch (USA).
