Dr. Daniel Bwala, the former spokesperson of the dissolved Presidential Campaign Council of Atiku Abubakar, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has said that Nigeria’s current government, led by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, will have issues with respecting the fundamental human rights of people.
In an interview with ARISE NEWS on Monday, Bwala, while expressing his views on the dismissal and arrests of the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, and the former Executive chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, said that there seemed to be a dismissal of the fundamental human rights of both individuals.
Speaking on Emefiele’s dismissal as the CBN governor and his arrest, Bwala said, “If you look at other officers in the last administration, appointees of the government, with respect to the information flying in the media space because we are not in a position to substantiate unless law enforcement comes out with anything about coaching and compelling. This will send shock to your spine to understand that the money they are looking for to do anything is in the last administration, was siphoned by officers of the government. The freedom of Emefiele’s fundamental right is crucial. This is what I am seeing with this administration. Respect for the human right is going to be an issue, and it is carried out in such a surreptitious way that you will not know because it is playing on the sentiments of the people. Where is Emefiele? Has he been charged to court?”
Speaking on Bawa’s removal as EFCC chairman and his arrest by the DSS, Bwala said, “The chairman of EFCC was recently arrested. They may have all of those details and deeps things about him, but what about his rights? Have his rights been observed? If there is an order received to detain him, that ought to have been made available to the Nigerian people because government is about accountability, and the idea that an institution, which is supposed to take anti-corruption is no longer dealing with anti-corruption matters, but institutions dealing with matters of security of the state is handling matters on anti-corruption, to me, will create a bit of confusion, and this is apart from the fact that it will create super rivalry between the agencies.”
“This is going to be a problem if there is no well-defined way of dealing with the situation. Then you have now seen, few days ago, somebody who has so many criminal charges against him, coming to the citadels of power, sit after meeting with the president, sit and address the nation, where he blackmailed the Nigerian Army, raw and in the daylight, that 99% of the problem of oil theft is caused by them without stating fact, no investigative report, no example. And this is the early signs to me that the institutions are being threatened to their very foundation. There is need for the president to coordinate what is happening around him.”
Ozioma Samuel-Ugwuezi
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