Human Rights Day: Concerns as human rights violations rise

• ‘Cases recorded daily’

As Nigeria joins the international community to mark this year’s Human Rights Day, lawyers, activists, and Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have raised concerns over rising cases of human rights violations across the country. They have also scored the federal government low regarding its posture on human rights enforcement in the country.

Human Rights Day is observed by the international community every year on December 10. It commemorates the day in 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Nigeria is a signatory to several international and regional human rights instruments to the extent that it’s Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act 2015, is said to be influenced by international standards of human rights protection.

Some of these treaties and charters Nigeria appended its signature to and ratified in some instance include the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights signed on 31 August 1982 and ratified on 22 July 1983; the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, which was signed on 16 December 2003, and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, which was signed on 13 July 1999 and ratified on 23 June 2001.

Others include the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which was signed on 28 July 1988 and ratified on 28 June 2001

In 2003, Nigeria adopted the Child Rights Act to domesticate the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was signed on 26 June, 1990 and ratified on 19 April, 1991. Aside that, Nigeria is also a signatory to the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflicts, which was ratified on 25 September 2012; as well as the Convention concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour, which was ratified on October 2nd, 2002.

In spite of these, lawyers and rights activists in separate interviews with Daily Trust, decried the rights posture of the current government. They said after riding on the crest of activism of Nigerians and CSOs, the government is now violating the human rights of Nigerians even more than what obtained during the military era.

Some of them cited the events and issues surrounding the arrest, detention, and re-arrest of Omoyele Sowore, the Convener of #RevolutionNow, among several other cases of alleged violation of fundamental human rights against the government.

A former National Security Adviser (NSA), Sambo Dasuki, has been in detention since late 2015, despite several orders of courts directing his release on bail. These orders include the one by the Court of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which declared his arrest and detention unlawful and arbitrary, awarding an N15million fine against the government.

Also cited is the case of the leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria, Ibrahim El-Zakzaky, and his wife, Zeenat.

A federal high court in Abuja on December 2, 2016, declared that his arrest and continued detention violated his fundamental rights.

Aside Sowore, Dasuki and El-Zakzaky, a journalist, Agba Jalingo will be celebrating this year’s human rights day in detention, while the whereabouts of Abubakar Idris, popularly known as Dadiyata, a government critic, who was abducted from his home in Kano on August 1, 2019, remains unknown. Dadiyata’s case, rights activists said, contravenes the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.

A human rights activist and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Ebun Adegboruwa said human right in Nigeria is currently under attack, saying ‘‘we are in a state where things are getting worse.

“Lives of Nigerians are in danger and the government cannot guarantee them. The right to freedom of expression is not tolerated and the media is being attacked through the Social media Bill and the amendment to broadcasting laws.

‘‘There are phantom trials of key opposition elements in order to force them into submission. Awaiting Trial Inmates (ATI) can no longer be given any guarantee as witnessed by the electrocution of inmates at the Ikoyi prison some days ago,” Adegoruwa said.

He mentioned that right to access to Court has also been curtailed because ‘‘Justice is now for the highest bidder as court filing fees are astronomically high across the nation’’.

The Executive Director of the Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, told Daily Trust that Nigerians cannot leave the respect of human right to anyone to help them to safe guard as it is their right to insist that their fundamental human rights be respected by the government.

Also, Mr. Austin Aigbe, who represented the Director of the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD), Idayat Hassan, said Nigerians are being taken for a ride and that violation of the rights of Nigerians are becoming too much to bear, hence the need for all Nigerians to take action.

Mr. Ezenwa Nwagwu of the Say No Campaign and Mr. Jaye Gaskia of the Take Back Nigeria (TBN) said the issue of ensuring the safeguard of the human rights of Nigerians cannot be outsourced to anyone and that Nigerians must demand accountability and respect for their rights.

Our correspondents report that cases of human rights violations are on the increase in the states.

In Katsina, most of the human rights abuses recorded at the office of the human rights commission in the state have to do with child labour and abuses, unlawful detention and rape.

The Coordinator of the state office, Barrister Adamu Kasim, said every case reported is vigorously pursued to ensure justice is served.

Khadijat Saualwa, the chairperson of Queen Dijah Women and children Initiatives, lamented the increasing abuses of children in the state and the slow process of justice ‘‘which makes offenders feel proud of their offences’’.

A Makurdi based human right activist and Founder of Jireh Doo Foundation, Josephine Habba, lamented that the challenges confronting her organisation in fighting abuses faced by women and children in Benue State were overwhelming.

“The government institutions make you more vulnerable, I took two matters to the Human Rights Commission in the state recently but no result. Nothing has been done yet.  One of the cases was about a girl of 14 who was abused but they took it back to the police and there, if you don’t have N15, 000 to carry on some paper procedures, the matters end there,” Habba said.

In Ogun, like other states, illegal detention, rape, and child defilement are said to be among the right abuses that are on increase.

In July, a one minute and 30 seconds video of a 26 year – old Chinedu Obi had gone viral showing him in a pool of blood having been allegedly shot in the leg at the Sango – Ota Police Station, Ado Odo/Ota LGA.

The victim, a graduate of Physics, University of Port Harcourt, who had visited his friend in Sango when the incident occurred, died as a result of the shooting.

Although, the video had generated uproar on the social media, the Ogun Police Command spokesman, Abimbola Oyeyemi told Daily Trust that the victim was shot when he grabbed an axe and attempted to attack armed policemen.

This claim was later contradicted by the victim’s younger brother, Udochukwu.

The Lagos State Chairman of the Committee for the defence of Human Rights (CDHR), Comrade Omotehinse said human rights violation in Lagos has become a daily occurrence.

According to him, human rights abuses in Lagos were perpetrated by both the government and individuals.

“The police abuse people daily through their stop and search. The police detain people in cells beyond the stipulated time.

“An education right which stipulates that every child must be educated up to secondary school level is being infringed upon as there are many school-age children roaming the streets. The Magistrates who are supposed to be monitoring the number of detainees in the police stations within their jurisdiction are not doing so,” he said.

In Kaduna, our correspondents report that torture, degrading treatment and illegal detention accounts for 80 percent of human rights violations.

For instance, on 11th November 2019, Hassana Saleh, a 29-year-old mother was rescued from a shack-like room in Rigasa, Igabi Local Government Area of Kaduna metropolis by a non-government organisation known as Arrida Relief Foundation.

Hassana had been married for 15years before she developed mental illness through depression when she was prevented from going back to her husband, forcing her brother, Lawal Saleh, to lock her up in a room where she urinated, defecated and ate for two years.

The Coordinator, National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in Kaduna, Terngu Gwar said, “when it comes to the issues of domestic violence which is also grouped together with sexual abuse it is about 50% of the cases we get here.”

The Commissioner of Human Services and Social Development, Hafsat Baba said the state government would ensure that justice is done to victims of human rights violations.

The Executive Chairman, Centre for Human Rights and Humanitarian Service Bayelsa State, Dr.  Whales Moulders Bimbo, said the centre has 2600 recorded cases of human rights abuses in the state from January to December 2019.

Bimbo, while speaking with Daily Trust in Yenagoa, said out of the 2600 recorded cases, the centre has been able to pursue 30 of it to the court for prosecution.

In Kano State, Shehu Abdullahi Kiru, the state coordinator of the National Human Rights Commission, said cases of human right violations are on the increase compared to what was recorded last year.

“Throughout 2018, our office received about 700 complaints of human right abuses of different nature, but from January this year to date we have received over 1000 complaints,’’ he said.