President Muhammadu Buhari has said the federal government will await pronouncements from state governments which set up panels to probe police brutality in the country.
The president said this Thursday while hosting the United States Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, at the State House, Abuja.
Daily Trust reports that the Lagos Judicial Panel of Inquiry and Restitution for Victims of SARS-related Abuses had on Monday submitted its report where it established that 48 casualties were recorded including 11 deaths, several missing persons, and many injured persons.
The federal and Lagos State governments had at various times maintained that there were no deaths at the Lekki Tollgate.
The panel in the 309-page report to the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, indicted the army, police, and the Lekki Concession Company (LCC) for various crimes, ranging from killing innocent protesters to trying to conceal evidence.
Following this, the US, Amnesty International, and other rights groups demanded implementation of the report including compensation for victims.
But the president told his guest yesterday that the government would allow the system to exhaust itself.
“So many state governments are involved and have given different terms of reference to the probe panels. We at the federal have to wait for the steps taken by the states, and we have to allow the system to work. We can’t impose ideas on them. Federal Government has to wait for the reaction of the states,” he said.
Blinken, who described the report of the EndSARS probe panel as “democracy in action,” stressed that America equally had its own police brutality, and expressed hope that necessary reforms would be made.
He added that America and Nigeria had diverse challenges, adding that a common denominator was security, and hoped for better partnerships, “so that the bad guys won’t get the good guys.”
Meanwhile, counsel for the Lagos State Government at the Lagos Judicial Panel of Inquiry and Restitution for Victims of SARS-related Abuses, Abiodun Owonikoko (SAN), has faulted the report of Justice Doris Okuwobi-led panel.
He said it was wrong for the panel to have awarded compensation to the victims of the October 20, 2020 shootings during the EndSARS protest at the Lekki Tollgate and forgotten about the policemen who also their lives.
Speaking on ‘The Morning Show’, a daily programme on Arise Television monitored by our correspondent, Owonikoko said the panel did not call the Lekki Concession Company (LCC) to tender its evidence, which he said was “major”.
He said he had issues with a member of the panel, Ebun Olu-Adegboruwa (SAN), who he said was consistently absent during Saturday sittings on the Lekki incident.
The Lagos counsel further said there was no place in the report that mentioned an attempt to attack a traditional ruler and raze down Oriental Hotel at Lekki by hoodlums during the protest.
He also said some of the protesters reported dead and which the panel awarded compensation of between N10 and N15million had come out to say they were alive.
Meanwhile, a member who represented the youth on the panel, Temitope Majekodunmi, has expressed disappointment over the leakage of the report. He said the leaked report could be one of those the panel was vetting prior to the presentation of the report to the governor.
He added that the contents of the leaked report “is not far from the original,” adding that some corrections were made in the original one.
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