It shocks and alarms us
on continuous basis concerning orchestrated and systematic stigmatization and
criminalization of the citizens’ rights to freedom of association, expression,
movement, personal liberty and fair hearing by the Nigerian Security Forces and
unprofessional print media; particularly since the inception of the Government
of Gen Muhammadu Buhari. Despite the enshrinement of these fundamental human
rights and their justiciability
(S.46), on account of their containment in Sections 40, 39, 41, 35 and 36
of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, as amended in
2011; they have suffered gross brutalization and bastardization in the hands of
the Security Forces and unprofessional print media.
Apart from the above constitutional guarantees and protections in
the 1999 Constitution, they are also fully recognized by the African Charter
on Human & Peoples’ Rights of 1981 (ACHPR), the UN Covenant on Civil &
Political Rights of 1976 (ICCPR) as well as the Basic Standard of
International Law & Humanitarian Principles of the United Nations; a
driving force of the Principles and Purposes of the United Nations. The
latter not only recognize the rights of the citizens of the Member-States of
the UN including Nigeria, to peaceful assemblies and expressions, but also
outline ways through which their exercises shall be managed or responded to by
security forces. As all are aware, Nigeria ratified ICCPR in 1993 and
ratified and domesticated the ACHPR in 1983. Nigeria is also bound morally and
legally by the Fundamental Rules of the United Nations including the basic standard of International
Law and Humanitarian Principles as well as the Purposes and Purposes of
the United Nations.
For instance, under the ten basic standards of
international law made mandatory for security forces of Member-States of
the UN for the management of civil assemblies and free speeches as well as
arrest, detention and prosecution of citizens accused of commission of
municipal crimes of whatever code definition; following key directives are
provided: (1) treat all victims of crime with compassion and respect, and in
particular protect their safety and privacy; (2) avoid using force when policing
unlawful but nonviolent assemblies; (3) when dispersing violent assemblies, use
force only to the minimum extent necessary (i.e. in line with proportionate use
of force and avoidance of application of excessive force on non-military
necessity).
Others are (4) arrest
no person unless there are legal wounds to do so and ensure that the arrest
is carried out in accordance with lawful arrest procedures; (5) ensure that all
detainees have access, promptly after arrest to their families and legal
representatives and to any necessary medical assistance; (6) all detainees must
be treated humanly and humanely and avoid infliction, instigation or toleration
of any act of torture in any circumstance and refuse to obey order to do so;
(7) do not carry out, order or cover up extrajudicial executions or
disappearances of the arrested or the detained and refuse to obey any
order to do so; (8) etc.
Sadly, these sacred international rules and obligations and their
sister provisions in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999,
as amended in 2011; are not only observed in gross breach by the security
forces and unprofessional print media in Nigeria but have also faced systematic
patterns of stigmatization and criminalization to the extent they are now
classified as military necessity, warranting
militarized and violent responses or actions including mass murder or massacre
of proponents of peaceful assemblies and free speeches and injuring of others.
Others are: unjust
arrest and detention of unarmed and innocent citizens without trial;
indiscriminate pre-trial or custodial killings, torture and disappearances. Today, the Nigerian Security Forces,
fully backed by a presidential death code issued by President Muhammadu Buhari;
erroneously and mischievously tagged: rules of engagement of the Nigerian
Armed Forces; place high security priority on peaceful assemblies and free
speeches than the activities of terrorist organizations or violent armed
opposition groups like Boko Haram and Fulani Janjaweed (Herdsmen).
As a matter of fact, the Buhari Administration does not consider
the violent activities of the Fulani Janjaweed, which lead to massacre of
hundreds of unarmed and innocent Nigerians almost on weekly bsis as a public
security threat requiring military actions under the UN’s Rules of Engagement
or the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Four Protocols of 1977.
The most abominable and unforgiving of it all is the Nigerian
Security Forces deliberate application or use of war-time military
approaches or methodologies in managing civil assemblies and democratic free
speeches. For the purpose of setting the records straight, civil or peaceful
assemblies and free speeches, no matter their intents, are purely
non-military or non-war or nonviolent affairs or conducts and are totally
devoid of military necessity, warranting State violent approaches or use
of force, not to talk of excessive application of State force or violence.
That is to say that the Rules
of Engagement of the UN and International Law recognition and
definition are strictly applied in war or conflict situations. Just like
we have severally educated publicly, the Rules of Engagement, which
are presently corrupted and bastardized by the Nigerian Armed Forces (including
the Army, Police, DSS, Navy, etc), are strictly applicable in international
or internal armed conflict; otherwise referred to as complex
humanitarian emergencies.
Key features of the
internationally standardized Rules of Engagement, strictly applied in
war or conflict situations are (1) legitimate use of force, (2)
proportionality of use of force, (3) legitimate self defense, (4) treatment of
prisoners of war or conflict, (5) avoidance of attacks on non-military
necessity or civilian targets or properties, (6) avoidance of attacks on
civilians or non-combatants, (7) treatment of the wounded, (8) avoidance of
attacks on culture symbols or places of worship, (9) avoidance of attacks on
humanitarian agencies and personnel/human rights activists; (10) treatment of
other peoples of the war (i.e. spies and journalists).
The Rules of
Engagement are the integral part of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and
their Four Protocols of 1977; and originally came from the three war
doctrines of Jus Ad Bellum (justification and ground for
going to war); Jus In Bellum (ethical rules of conduct during
war, such as ethical standards expected of soldiers in wartime or rules
of engagement); and Jus Post Bellum (regulations on how
wars are ended and facilitation of transition from war to peace).
Another name for the
Rules of Engagement is the Standard Rules for the People of the War. The
People of the War here literally means parties in the conflict
who occupy the conflict areas such as fighting parties, non-combatants or
civilians as well as other third parties playing direct or indirect roles in
the conflict.
In all, non-war civil
conducts such as civil or peaceful assemblies and democratic free speeches have
nothing whatsoever to do with the so called Rules of Engagement of the
Nigerian Armed Forces neither do they have any to do with the UN and
International Law’s standardized Rules of Engagement. In managing civil
assemblies and democratic free speeches for whatever intents, use of military
actions including mass shooting and wounding of protesters and militarization
of the protesting entities are out-rightly and inexcusably forbidden.
Such civil assemblies
and free speeches even if they turn non-lethally violent are managed under UN
System or within the confines of international best practices using modern
non-lethal crowd control instruments or devices such as tear gas, rubber
bullets, pepper spray, electric tasers, batons, whips, water cannons, long
range acoustic devices, aerial surveillance, police dogs, etc; which are
aided by body protective devices such as anti crowd helmets, face
visors, body armor (i.e. vests, neck protectors, knee pads, etc), gas masks and
anti crowd shields?
This special human
rights education or public awareness on management of civil or peaceful
assemblies and free speeches in Nigeria is extremely necessary so as to
educate, expose and condemn the intensified stigmatization and criminalization
of same by Nigerian Security Forces and unprofessional print media. The
stigmatization and criminalization under reference are done deliberately and
systematically by the security forces as a justification for committing the
highlighted conduct atrocities which amount to crimes against humanity (i.e.
State crimes or regime atrocities committed against unarmed and innocent
citizens in peacetime or in non-war situations). Unprofessionalism or media
corruption or both are chiefly suspected as the brain behind print media’s
conspiracy in stigmatizing and criminalizing civil or peaceful assemblies and
free speeches in Nigeria.
The Nigerian Security
Forces particularly the Nigerian Army, Nigeria Police Force and the DSS have steadily
or systematically stigmatized and criminalized Pro Biafra agitations in
Nigeria. Apart from official nonviolence stance declared by the leadership of
the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), totality of our advocacy investigations
particularly in the Southeast and the South-south of Nigeria as they relate to
IPOB agitation matches, rallies and processions, has not, till date, found the
group engaging in violent and other traditional crime conducts such as looting,
car-jacking, abduction/kidnapping, armed robbery, extortion, sexual harassment,
house breaking or stealing during or after its street or in-door protests.
We have also not found
IPOB as a group using or advocating violence as a method in its self
determination agitation for the status of its Biafra Land through national or
international referenda. Till date, the group is not traced to any form of
armed rebellion or insurrection or armed uprising in Nigeria or any part
thereof. Where pockets of breaches are recorded during its public peacefully
intended protests, such happened on account of State provocation through use of
massive State violence or expression of anger for mass murder and other mass
shooting of its unarmed and defenseless members by security forces particularly
the Nigerian Army.
The stigmatization and
criminalization of the IPOB peaceful and lawful agitation and free speeches
have thickened in recent months particularly in the press conferences and other
public statements issued by the Nigerian Army, Nigeria Police Force and the
DSS. IPOB has in several of these publications been classified as “militant
group”, “terrorist group” or “armed Independent People of Biafra (A-IPOB)”. At
the other time, the group was tagged “insurrectionist group”.
Apart from these
criminal labeling, the Police, DSS and the Army have gone further to clamp down
on its members and sympathizers and treat them as “terrorist suspects”;
clamping and detaining them for months without trial. In the course of all
these, the provisions of the 1999 Constitution are breached with reckless
abandon. Comrade Chidiebere Onwudiwe, for instance, has been detained
incommunicado as a “terrorist” for 94 days without trial or administrative
bail, having been arrested, according to the official statement of the DSS, on
22nd June 2016.
By the express provision of Section 35 (4) (a) of the 1999
Constitution, Comrade Chidiebere Onwudiwe is no longer triable, having
been held incommunicado or without administrative or court bail for over two
months or 60 days. He is also not triable having been held in DSS
custody for over 90days without bail and trial. This is contrary to Section 35
(4) (b) of the Constitution. We call on the Attorney General of the Federation
to take note!
The Nigerian Security Forces also routinely torture their detained
IPOB activists for the purpose of forcing them into admitting being
“terrorists” when not even fireworks were found on them. They routinely raid
their residences in the dead of the night, shoot and arrest them and take them
away without informing them of crimes under which they were arrested. The
security forces also compile lists of unarmed and defenseless members of the
Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and put them in their wanted list. IPOB
activists arrested and detained are also made victims of jungle justice
or trial-by-ordeal.
The unprofessional print
media, on their part, have steadily stigmatized and criminalized the IPOB
nonviolent protests. Even when such protests are sit-at-home, the print media
must find a way of stigmatizing and criminalizing same. The Vanguard and the
Sun Newspapers news reports of Saturday, September 24, 2016 on IPOB organized
sit-at-home protest in the Southeast and the South-south of Nigeria per their
Saturday Editors; are a clear case in point.
For instance, apart from
attempts to create a false public impression of “failure” of the sit-at-home
protest, the editors further claimed that “that those who stayed away did so
because of fears of being attacked by IPOB”; thereby labeling IPOB a violent
group or an armed uprising group.
At Intersociety, we got surprise calls from some journalists on
Friday, 22nd September 2016 (day of IPOB organized sit-at-home
protest) asking us “how many trailers were burnt in Onitsha”. This is when it
is clear to them that the protest was sit-at-home and not street protest. Which
explains our position that “the stigmatization and criminalization of peaceful
assemblies and free speeches (i.e. IPOB led protests) by the print media are
borne out of unprofessionalism or media corruption or both”.
We condemn in its entirety the stigmatization and criminalization
of civil and nonviolent protests and democratic free speeches in Nigeria. The
conspiracy of the print media in the conduct atrocities is further condemned.
We call on all Nigerians and members of the international community to take
advocacy notice of this special publication and stand up at all times against
stigmatization and criminalization of civil assemblies and free speeches by the
Nigerian Armed Forces and their unprofessional print media collaborators.
Rights to freedom of association, expression, movement, fair hearing and
personal liberty, which are locally and internationally recognized and
entrenched, must be defended and upheld by all and sundry at all times.
Signed:
Emeka Umeagbalasi,
B.Sc., Criminology & Security Studies; M.Sc. (c), Peace & Conflict
Studies
Board Chairman,
International Society for Civil Liberties & the Rule of Law-INTERSOCIETY
Mobile Line:
+2348174090052
Email: info@intersociety-ng.org
Website: www.intersociety-ng.org
Obianuju Igboeli, Esq.,
LLB, BL; LLM (c)
Head, Civil Liberties
& Rule of Law Program
Mobile Line:
+2348034186332
Chinwe Umeche, Esq.,
LLB, BL
Mobile Line: +2347013238673
Head, Democracy & Good Governance Program
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