The Human Right Writers Association Of Nigeria (HURIWA) has decried the alleged politically tainted arrest and detention of officials of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) by operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS).
HURIWA condemned the ‘illegal’ activities of the Kaduna state Directorate of DSS over its clampdown on PDP under the guises of some phantom and trumped-up charges that the political leaders were involved in hate speeches.
The body warned that if the trend continues, then the elections would be tainted by corrupt practices in favour of the incumbent, thereby denying legitimacy and credibility to the process.
In a statement signed and forwarded to DAILY POST by it’s National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, the Non-Governmental Organisation said “The outcomes may occasion upsurge of migrations from the Country by those genuinely afraid for their lives because of their Political differences with the incumbent President who has demonstrated overwhelming preferences for appointing only his tribesmen and religious cohorts into strategic internal security and defence portfolios.”
The rights group also lambasted the highly partisan DSS for keeping mute and for her conspiratorial silence when the Kaduna State Governor, Malam Nassir El Rufai openly canvassed hate crime by threatening to kill off foreign observers should they interfere in the February 16th polls.
The statement reads: ”The actions and inactions of the secret police which portrays it as highly partisan and politically compromised will inevitably damage the institutional integrity of the body which is a statutory and corporate entity funded by the people of Nigeria even though the office is domiciled wrongly under the presidency.
“We are by this media intervention calling on the Director General of DSS to abide by the tenets of the constitution and carry out the obligations of the department in total compliance with the due process of the law and not turn the institution to private guards of All Progressive Congress.
“The operatives of DSS are totally wrong and prejudicial to clamp down on PDP officials who were going about the legitimate campaign activities in which case not a single life has been lost unlike the campaign rallies of the Kaduna state governor in which case fatalities were recorded and the governor called for body bags for foreign observers.”
“The arbitrary arrests and detention of the PDP officials violates the chapter 4 of the constitution and is meant to clip the wings of the opposition party and cripple multiparty democracy in Kaduna state and to foist a predetermined outcome in favour of the APC in the February 16th election and the gubernatorial poll in early March.”
HURIWA specifically cited provisions of the ground norm that are breached by the arbitrary arrests and detention of opposition politicians to include; Section 35 (1) of the Nigerian constitution that states thus “Every person shall be entitled to his personal liberty and no person shall be deprived of such liberty save in the following cases and in accordance with a procedure permitted by law – in execution of the sentence or order of a court in respect of a criminal offence of which he has been found guilty
”By reason of his failure to comply with the order of a court or in order to secure the fulfillment of any obligation imposed upon him by law, for the purpose of bringing him before a court in execution of the order of a court or upon reasonable suspicion of his having committed a criminal offence, or to such extent as may be reasonably necessary to prevent his committing a criminal offence.”
HURIWA has also promised to sponsor a bill before the National Assembly in the next session to grant full autonomy to the DSS to operate just like the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the United States of America.
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