FOR the umpteenth time, the regime of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), has demonstrated its characteristically strong but disturbing disdain for the democratic rights of Nigerian citizens to peaceful protest. This is as heavy police deployments disrupted the June 12 protests at different venues across the country as Nigeria marked Democracy Day 2021. The irony is unmistakable. On a day chosen to mark democracy in the country, the Buhari regime came out charging at the citizens expressing their inalienable right, deploying heavily armed police personnel and armoured personnel carriers to intimidate the protesters, condoning off protest venues, hounding and beating up protesters in the process.
This is unconstitutional, authoritarian and utterly unacceptable. It grossly negates the core democratic tenets of freedom of assembly, association, and expression. As the Open Society Justice Initiative rightly declares, “protests are a catalyst for social change and are essential for citizen participation in a pluralistic democracy. They enable individuals and groups to share their views and interests, express dissent, and make demands of the government or other institutions.” Sadly, despite its importance to democratic sustainability, in both advanced and emerging democracies, “some police and government officials treat protests as an inconvenience, a disruption to be controlled, or a threat to be extinguished,” the group laments.
The police clampdown on the peaceful June 12 protesters demonstrates an aversion to democracy by the Buhari regime. Indeed, it is a detestable act of desperation by a regime that has failed to live up to the expectations of the citizens and lacks faith in a process that birthed it. The action has further depleted Buhari’s low legitimacy account balance.
Democracy does not begin and end in conducting periodic elections. Protests are also an essential element of democracy and provide a veritable outlet for the citizens to interact with the government in a different dimension. Unfortunately, the regime does not see it that way, hence the resort to its criminalisation.
In Lagos, media reports stated that police officers fired tear gas at the crowd gathered at the Gani Fawehinmi Park in Ojota, Lagos. In the Gudu area of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, police similarly tear-gassed and chased away the protesters. Earlier on May 31, an online publisher, Omoyele Sowore, was injured by a tear gas canister fired by a female police officer while he and others under the aegis of the CSO, Alliance on Surviving COVID-19 and Beyond, demonstrated in Abuja. The group was protesting widespread insecurity in the country. Media reports said Sowore, and other protesters were approaching the protest venue when armed police shut down the place. Unfortunately, the police do not display such sternness and ruthlessness towards the rampaging bandits, kidnappers and outlaws currently holding the entire country to ransom. Ironically, police provided cover for demonstrators who gathered in Abuja in support of the regime, according to reports.
The Cross River State Police Command had earlier threatened intending protesters, promising to deal ruthlessly with anyone who dared it. The command warned, “Everybody should be sober and, in their houses given the experience people had particularly during #EndSARS protests, we will not allow such an incident to repeat itself. We have got intelligence reports on how people are planning to disrupt the peace of the state in the form of a protest and unlawful gathering, as well as to embark on the violent destruction of property; we will not allow that.” This is unacceptable. The duty of the law enforcement agencies in a democracy is not to force protesting citizens off the streets but to ensure such a democratic exercise is not hijacked by unscrupulous elements. That is a breach of their right to freedom of movement and assembly. The failure of the security agencies to do this led to the fatal hijacking of the #EndSARS protests against police brutality across the country in October 2020.
It is commendable, however, that Nigerians in many parts of the world like the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Canada joined their courageous counterparts at home who braved official harassment to protest against bad governance and insecurity in the country. Citizens should not succumb to police intimidation to shun peaceful protest. It is a democratic right that cannot be circumscribed by any government agency. Protests, experts say, encourage the development of an engaged and informed citizenry and strengthen representative democracy by enabling direct participation in public affairs. Nigeria is a signatory to several constitutional and legal frameworks that support protest as a democratic right. Article 21 of the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, for instance, provides: “The right of peaceful assembly shall be recognised. No restrictions may be placed on this right other than those imposed in conformity with the law, and which are necessary for a democratic society…”
Also, Article 11 of the 1981 African Charter on Human and People’s Rights states, “Every individual shall have the right to assemble freely with others.” Similarly, sections 39 and 40 of the 1999 Constitution guarantee the citizens the right to freedom of assembly and expression. And under Section 45, there must be a state of emergency properly declared before these rights can be violated. The onus is on the government to always protect these constitutional rights and not constitute itself into a stumbling block to their attainment. Violently stopping free protests in a fragile democracy like ours, as has been regularly done under Buhari, tends to radicalise the protesters with dire consequences for the entire country.
The right to assemble freely cannot be abridged without violating the fundamental right to peaceful assembly and association. As a civil rights lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN), argued, the violation can only be done by the procedure permitted by law, under Section 45 of the constitution, in which case there must be a state of emergency properly declared. The criminal law is there to be applied if protesters resort to violence during a demonstration, but once the rights are exercised peacefully, they cannot be taken away.
Ensuring that government works for the public good requires informed, organised, active and peaceful citizen participation. Nigerian citizens should tenaciously hold on to this.
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