Presidential Support Coalition Initiative (PSCI) has lauded President Muhammadu Buhari over his handling of the recent nationwide youth protests against police brutality.
Some youth have protested to call for the disbandment of the Special Anti Robbery Squad (SARS) and an end to police brutality.
The protests turned violent when some hoodlums hijacked the process, destroying public and private properties and looting stores and wharehouses in some parts of the country.
The PSCI National President, Amb. Ahmed Abdulazeez, in a statement issued on Tuesday, also hailed security personnel, particularly, the police and the military for their restraints in the face of provocation.
Amb. Abdulazeez, who holds the traditional title of Chiroman Sumaila in Kano state, said it takes a President with the patience and understanding of President Buhari to maintain calm and even accede to the requests of the protesters even when their conduct lacked orderliness.
He also lauded President Buhari for acting in the best interest of the country by remaining focus even when it became clear that some opposition politicians had infiltrated the genuine protesters to make the country ungovernable.
The Chiroma praised the police for their continued observance of Rule of Engagement even at the risk of their lives when the protest turned ugly.
He said the conduct of the police while the protests lasted was worthy of emulation by their counterparts in other African countries.
He voiced his regrets that a protest which was started as a peaceful movement for a worthy cause soon turned bloody leading to the killings of scores of police personnel and torching their stations across the country.
The Ambassador, who observed that but for the professional conducts of the police the situation would have led to complete anarchy, added that the youth failed to consider that the police also had their challenges while trying to maintain law and order in the society.
Abdulazeez, who prayed for the repose of the lives of the fallen police officers, called on the youth to see the police as people with families who deserved empathy and understanding too.
He called on the youth to desist from seeing police officers as enemies, but partners in combating criminality and maintaining law and order for the peaceful enjoyment of their constitutional rights to movements and assembly.
He cautioned the youth against resorting to killings, vandalism and other acts of lawlessness while demanding for their rights going forward, adding that it would cost the country to replace those police stations and other valuables destroyed in the cause of the protest.
The PSCI National President, who called on the government and police authorities to do the needful for the families of the departed police officers, appealed to the federal and state governments to evolve ways of absorbing the teeming unemployed youth into doing something gainful with their lives.
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