Insecurity: Buhari can’t abridge citizens’ freedom of speech, HURIWA tells Adesina

The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has asked the Presidential Media Adviser, Mr. Femi Adesina, to understand that President Muhammadu Buhari is not an absolute monarch who has arbitrary powers to abridge the constitutionally guaranteed fundamental freedoms of the citizens.

The human rights group’s National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, said on Wednesday in Abuja that it was wrong for Mr. Adesina to be cautioning those calling for the resignation of the President.

According to him, Adesina saying that those calling for Buhari’s resignation due to the issue of insecurity in Nigeria were only exercising their freedom of speech, but such expression has its limitations, is unacceptable.

The HURIWA boss faulted the presidential spokesman stance that freedom of expression is limited to the extent that they cannot advocate the resignation of the president if he is not doing enough to secure the country.

“Apart the fundamental Rights provisions of chapter four of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria of 1999 (as amended), the Grund norm in section 14 (2) (a) provides that “sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria from whom government through this constitution derives all its power and authority”.

HURIWA therefore expresses disappointment that the Presidential Media Advisor can spread the fake news that the same Nigerians who ‘gave the legitimacy to the President and other elected public office holders to exercise authority, cannot at the same time exercise their fundamental Human Rights Constitutionally guaranteed to advocate the resignation of a non-performing President especially if the President fails to discharge his primary legal duty spelt out in section 14 (2) (b) which says that the primary duty of government is the protection of lives and property and the welfare of the citizenry.

He said that though the right to freedom of expression, like most other rights, is not absolute and that there are recognised restrictions and exceptions to this right, President Muhammadu Buhari, as an elected government bound by the Constitution, has no absolutist powers to abridge the human rights of citizens which constitutionally guaranteed fundamental freedoms of the citizens.