Nigerians woke up last week to the shocking news of the
deportation by the Lagos State Government of some 70 fellow Nigerians. As the
story goes, officials of the Lagos State Government, accompanied by a
contingent of policemen, loaded about 70 people, of South-East and South-South
origin, into vehicles. The vehicles left Lagos, driving all night. When they
reached Onitsha Bridgehead, Anambra State, 470 kilometres away and at the
unholy hour of 3am, the officials simply offloaded the passengers by the
roadside, turned their vehicles around and headed back to Lagos. Those of the
deportees who were strong and sane enough found their way to their country
homes, while the weak and the confused remained on that spot till the city woke
up to behold this pathetic victims of man’s inhumanity to man.
The hue and cry this inhumane treatment generated can only
be compared to the outcry that greeted the mass killing of, and mass exodus of
South-Easterners from, the North in the 1960s, events that sparked the Nigerian
Civil War.
Universally, government’s primary duty is the protection of
the weak. Therefore, this rash deportation of apparently disadvantaged
Nigerians by the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) regime in Lagos State amounts
to the abdication of a moral, legal and constitutional responsibility it owes
to Nigerian citizens naturally. Such an action runs against the spirit of the
social contract between the government and the governed. The extradition of our
Igbo brothers and sisters from Lagos is reckless, despotic, provocative and
unconstitutional. It is a flagrant display of Executive lawlessness. It is
descent into Apartheid. And it sends dangerous signals through the Nigerian
Federation.
It holds grave implications for the unity and concord
existing amongst Nigerians. Already, Governor Peter Obi of Anambra State has
threatened collateral reciprocity, and understandably too.
But the deportation raises questions: Why should a Nigerian
not feel free to live anywhere in Nigeria? And then, what actually is the worth
of a Nigerian life?
Seven years ago, Israel went to war against Lebanon just to
secure the freedom of ONLY two (underscore the number TWO) Israeli soldiers
captured by Hezbollah militants operating from Southern Lebanon. Israel thus
launched full-scale war against Southern Lebanon. In that 2006 quest, the
Jewish nation sacrificed 165 Israeli soldiers, killed almost 2,000 Lebanese people,
damaged Lebanese civil infrastructure on a massive scale, and displaced approximately
one million Lebanese and 500,000 Israelis. Coming after the Entebbe
incident in which the Jewish nation invaded Uganda to free Jewish hostages in
1976, this Israel-Lebanon war unequivocally demonstrated to the world that
Israel valued Israeli lives and dignity. That is the stuff that breeds
nationalism and patriotism.
THE ACN GOVERNMENT AND HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
Unfortunately, civil society groups have maintained a
conspiratorial silence on Lagos State’s invidious action. These same people
would have raised hell were this action taken by another party, other than ACN.
We cannot afford to play politics with the lives of fellow Nigerians. Members
of civil society must challenge Lagos State on this act of impunity. Questions
must be asked: How much will it cost Lagos State to fend for these unfortunate
people? What damage will it do to Lagos State’s budget? As many of these people
voted for the ACN government in Lagos State; is this how the ACN pays back?
REDRESS FOR THE DEPORTED 70
Rather than continue to defend the indefensible, Lagos State
should bury its head in shame, seek the forgiveness of Governor Peter Obi and
other Easterners and make conciliatory gestures.
Lagos must retract the eviction of these 70 people and
provide transport for readmitting them into the state.
Lagos must put together a compensation and rehabilitation
plan for the victims.
Lagos State must apologise to people of the South-East and
the South-South for this chauvinistic act.
Never again must such an action be taken in Nigeria against
bonafide Nigerian citizens.
WHAT ABOUT CITIZENSHIP AND HUMAN RIGHTS?
Legally speaking, within these boundaries, Igbo people, like
everyone else, remain Nigerians. Nigeria, as a country, has one and only one
citizenship. Nigeria has only one passport. Whoever is born within the Nigerian
space, with any of his parents or grandparents indigenous to Nigeria,
automatically qualifies as a citizen of this country, according to Section
25 of the Constitution.
Igbo people are Nigerians, whether rich or poor, affluent or
destitute. In Nigeria today, the Igbo stock represents one of the most
enterprising tribes in this country. They are part and parcel of the enviable
socio-economic cum socio-political advancement of Lagos State. As big-time
businesses and petty traders, our Igbo brothers and sisters contribute
substantially to the Internally-Generated Revenue that has made Lagos the most
illustrious state in the Federation, outside petroleum funds from the Federal
allocation.
We protest the inhuman treatment dispensed to these our
fellow Nigerians. Evidently, these poor deportees were hounded, manhandled,
maltreated and dumped like garbage, which is evident from the following:
1. The manner of their apprehension
–some were apprehended for crossing, begging or hawking on busy highways
2. Their deprivation of legal
representation, as they never had access to lawyers to defend them
3. Their summary expulsion from a
part of Nigeria their Fatherland
4. Their being subjected to
indignities, having been detained and transported like illegal aliens in their
Fatherland, and
5. The manner of their dumping –past
midnight on a major highway, without regard to their personal safety or
security.
The deportation not only violates all known international conventions
and Human Rights charters, it assaults the “Right to Freedom of Movement”
enshrined in Sections 41-42 of the Nigerian Constitution. Inter
alia, the Sections stipulate as follows:
Every citizen of Nigeria is entitled to move freely
throughout Nigeria and to reside in any part thereof, and no citizen of Nigeria
shall be expelled from Nigeria or refused entry thereby or exit therefrom...
A citizen of Nigeria of a particular community, ethnic group, place of
origin, sex, religion or political opinion shall not, by reason only that he is
such a person be subjected either expressly by, or in the practical application
of, any law in force in Nigeria or any executive or administrative action of the
government, to disabilities or restrictions to which citizens of Nigeria of
other communities, ethnic groups, places of origin, sex, religions or political
opinions are not made subject...
No citizen of Nigeria shall be subjected to any disability
or deprivation merely by reason of the circumstances of his birth.
In consequence of these constitutional provisions, no
Nigerian citizen can be deported even by the Nigerian State, let alone a state
government. That has been pretty well laid to rest in the 1980 case of Alhaji
Abdulrahman Shugaba. For deporting Shugaba, born of a Nigerian mother but a
Chadian father, the Federal Government under Alhaji Shehu Shagari was ordered
to pay a compensation of N350,000. That amount was then about $350,000, today’s
equivalent of N54.6 million. The Supreme Court only confirmed the ruling of the
two lower courts, when the government appealed.
And America expresses the same character in its statutes. In
subscription to similar provisions on personal liberty in its Constitution,
USA, despite having the best facilities in the world for people in such
conditions, allows homeless destitute and mentally challenged individuals to
roam without molestation by government agencies, even in the capital city
Washington DC. In fact, such afflicted citizens must volunteer before being
admitted into facilities provided by the US.
ACN’S ANTI-PEOPLE POLICIES
In Lagos today, impunity is the watchword. Laws are made
without a human face. Agencies and agents of the government, from state through
the local governments, dehumanise citizens. The aggregate of all this has
turned Lagos into a police state and put Lagosians under siege.
Many cases of impunity abound in the ACN-run Lagos State,
some predate the regime of Governor Raji Fashola. Examples include:
·
Selling off state-owned lands and complexes to private persons and politicians
·
Mysterious burning of markets like Tejuosho and handing over of the sites to
favoured private developers, with new shops priced beyond the reach of original
traders and owners
·
Banning of commercial motorcycles and tricycles without providing alternative
means to operators and commuters
·
Demolishing shops, businesses, market spaces and depriving people of means of
livelihood without providing alternatives
·
Contributing to the incidence of collapsed buildings through overpricing of
regulatory services
·
Jacking up the N25,000 school fees for students of the Lagos State University
to N250,000, an increase of 1,000 percent.
·
Providing a hostile environment for business with features like double
taxation, and destruction of billboards, posters, signboards, point-of-sale
(POS) displays and vehicle branding, unwholesome anti-business attitudes that
have forced factories to relocate from Lagos to neighbouring Ogun and Oyo
states and as far away as Cotonou, Togo and Ghana.
Our investigation shows that, beginning with the last
regime, the Lagos State Government has a high tally of Human Rights violations.
Agencies like KAI, LASTMA and the Task Force on Environmental Offences
routinely arrest and throw people into illegal detention centres operated by
the administration. Victims are held in sub-human conditions, where they lack
access to food, toilet, sleeping space or legal representation. Such victims
languish in detention cells located at Alausa, Kirikiri Prisons, Potoki Prisons
in Badagry and Ikorodu Prisons. In all these places, people are in confinement
for menial reasons like driving offences, for crossing the highway, for any of
the ubiquitous environmental related offences, including urinating in a public
drain, for street trading, for riding commercial motorcycles, and so on.
In all this, the ACN-dominated State House of Assembly
continues to maintain a criminal apathy, an unholy silence and an anti-people
acquiescence.
UPN hereby calls on Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola, Senior
Advocate of Nigeria, to immediately disband these extra-judicial and illegal
detention cells and release all detainees.
Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. UPN
urges Lagos State citizens to use their votes to check the unbridled power and
the impunity ravaging citizens of Lagos State.
THE UPN PROMISE
In UPN, we shall continue to work for the unity of Nigeria.
This commitment has been enshrined in our Constitution, Manifesto and our
slogan.
“UPN! Up Nigeria!”
We shall review all cases of demolitions and pay
compensation to landlords, once ownership is established, whether they have a
Certificate of Occupancy or not.
To protect Nigerians in Nigeria, UPN shall make provision
for the convening of the Sovereign National Conference as a matter of national
emergency, and push for making Human Rights abuses actionable.
Such a Sovereign National Conference will help curtail the
excesses of members of the National Assembly and prevent the insertion into the
Constitution of any provision allocating salaries-for-life to legislators, in
addition to the immoral jumbo pay they have already cornered for themselves.
In addition, UPN shall hold itself liable to providing free
education and free healthcare, as well as an unemployment grant to unemployed
graduates. And UPN will not deport destitute Nigerians.
Like Martin Luther King (Junior), UPN will help build a
nation where no Nigerian will be judged by tribe, tongue or status, but by
merit and character.
TEXT OF
PRESS CONFERENCE BY DR. FREDERICK FASEHUN, CHAIRMAN, UNITY PARTY OF NIGERIA
(UPN) AT CENTURY HOTEL, OKOTA, LAGOS, ON AUGUST 6, 2013
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