Nigeria: Writers Association Wants Justice for Abducted Journalist

Human Rights Writers’ Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, has tasked the Inspector General of Police Mr. Ogbonna Onovo and the Police Service Commission to ensure that all the Owerri-based operatives of the Nigeria Police who interloped into the Federal Capital Territory and abducted the Abuja-based journalist, Mr. Maximus Uba to Imo State are prosecuted, for breaching the fundamental human rights of freedom from arbitrary arrest and abduction enshrined in chapter four of the 1999 constitution.

Specifically, about a week ago, a detachment of plain clothed police operatives stormed the lobby of the Transcorp Hilton in the nation’s capital and abducted Uba, an Abuja-based journalist and critic of the Imo State Governor, Ikedi Ohakim.

Uba was later dragged to the Owerri Magistrate Court and slammed with a nebulous charge of alleged defamation of Ohakim. After about a weeks detention by the police without any valid and subsisting court warrants, Mr. Uba was granted bail by the magistrate court in Owerri, Imo State after a team of lawyers made spirited efforts to secure his freedom.

In a media statement jointly endorsed by its National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and its Senior Program Manager Barrister Lynette Kifordu, HURIWA, also criticised the Imo State Police command for pandering to the political whims and caprices of the Imo State administration by serving as willing tools for the repression, oppression and physical intimidation, harassment and victimization established opposition critics in the State.

The association further called on the National Security Adviser, General Sarki Muktar [rtd] and the Acting President Dr. Good Luck Jonathan to take special interest in the unprecedented rise in alleged politically-motivated kidnapping and abductions of perceived political opponents of the Imo State current administration to save the state from approaching the precipice of instability and insecurity.

According to HURIWA ‘’ We in the Human Rights community in Nigeria are shocked that political office holders in the current dispensation especially at the state level have constituted themselves into obstacles to the systematic and institutional growth of democracy, the rule of law and respect for the Human Rights of citizens irrespective of religious, ethnic or political orientations. The attitude of our so-called state Governors especially their renewed clampdown on media workers who they wrongly perceive as enemies will not augur well for the sustenance and consolidation of Nigeria’s democracy because any democracy without a vibrant media is doomed.’’

On the recent abduction by the operatives of the Nigeria Police of the Abuja-based Journalist Maximus Uba for trial in Owerri without any valid court warrant of arrest, the Human Rights group condemned what it calls a very potentially dangerous trend which could imperil the sustenance of Nigeria’s democracy and could serve as tonic and encouragement for criminal elements to continue to perpetrate the current reign of criminal abduction for ransoms of Nigerians and other foreign citizens resident in Nigeria.

 According to HURIWA; ‘’We condemn in no uncertain terms this scenario of state governors engineering the police to kidnap journalists who are perceived to be writing stories not favourable to these political office holders. We note with considerable sadness and trepidation that not too long ago, another set of well armed police operatives from Yenogua, Bayelsa State on the orders of the state governor, invaded the precincts of the Nigeria Union of Journalists office in Abuja and physically kidnapped a reputable journalist and editor with a National newspaper - Weekend Life, Mr. Akin Orimolade and bundled him to Bayelsa State to face a trumped up charge of alleged defamation of the character of the State Governor, Mr. Timipre Sylva. We condemn this ugly pattern of grave media repression in the country for these retrogressive steps are targeted towards undermining the consolidation of democracy and the rule of law.’’   

- February 27, 2010 by This Day

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Source: www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php (accessed on 01.03.2010)