Yearly Archives: 2020

As recorded on House of Commons Hansard Nigeria: Sanctions Regime [James Gray in the Chair] Here is the full transcript of the 23 Nov 2020 debate as recorded in Hansard. https://youtu.be/RJ9CZaRoTkE 6.00 pm Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con) I beg to move, That this House has considered e-petition 554150, relating to Nigeria and the sanctions regime. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I thank the 220,330 people who have signed the petition—when I last checked it this morning—especially the 853 who are my constituents in Chipping Barnet. This petition has been prompted by disturbing events in Nigeria over recent weeks. There have been widespread protests regarding the activities of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad of the Nigerian police, known as SARS. That unit has a deeply controversial reputation and the hashtag #EndSARS started to appear prominently on social media in 2017. Reports…

Emmanuel Akinwotu West Africa correspondent, Tue 24 Nov 2020 10.21 GMT Protests against Sars security unit in west African country were violently suppressed Labour has called for the UK government to consider suspending the funding and training of security forces in Nigeria, where protests against a notorious police unit were brutally suppressed last month. Kate Osamor, the MP for Edmonton, said she had serious concerns about a lack of oversight of the UK’s role, especially in relation to the special anti-robbery squad (Sars), which was disbanded in October after allegations of killings and abuse. The same month, protests against police abuses were brutally suppressed by the Nigerian police and military, which have been authorised to purchase at least £127m-worth of UK registered arms since 2008. Dozens of protesters were killed, including at least 12 people gunned down by soldiers in Lagos, according to Amnesty International. Despite widespread outrage,…

on November 19, 2020 By GWG Staff United States-based Cable News Network, CNN has rebuffed what it described as threats by the Nigerian government against it saying that it stands by its story on the Lekki Tollgate shooting of October 20. Responding to the threats of sanctions against the news network by the minister of information and culture, Lai Mohammed on Thursday, CNN said that its story was the product of extensive investigations. CNN said that video evidence obtained was also geolocated. Mohammed had at a press briefing on Thursday threatened CNN with unstated sanctions for what it described as unprofessional journalism. “Like everyone else, I watched the CNN report. I must tell you that it reinforces the disinformation that is going around, and it is blatantly irresponsible and a poor piece of journalistic work by a reputable international news organization,” Mohammed told reporters at…

'They pointed their guns at us and started shooting' https://youtu.be/GuEcSr1Z7bo Editor's Note: (This story contains graphic imagery of injury and death. The full names of some interviewees and the identities of others have been withheld for their safety.)View this interactive content on CNN.comView this interactive content on CNN.com Sometime after midnight on October 21, Elisha Sunday Ibanga answered a phone call from his older brother's number. The person on the other end of the line -- a stranger -- broke the news that Ibanga's brother, Victor, had been shot dead at the Lekki toll gate, in Lagos, Nigeria, where he had been peacefully protesting against police brutality earlier that night. "The person told me that the police took his body away," Ibanga, 24, told CNN. An eyewitness to Victor Sunday Ibanga's death told CNN the 27-year-old entrepreneur was shot in the head during the protest.…

OPINION Published 2 days ago  on 2020/11/12 ByDavid Hundeyin Estimated Reading Time: 17 “I’ve been getting calls. I’ve been getting many calls, David. You have been writing things. Have you seen the SSS Headquarters in Abuja? It goes 7 storeys underground. When they put you inside there, even with these your glasses, you won’t be able to see anything.” These remarks, delivered at a family function in 2019 with a smile and a laugh from the mouth of an uncle who had just retired from a top job at one of Nigeria’s security agencies, was the first time I ever received something that could be classified as a “threat.” At the time, I was no stranger to receiving angry feedback over my work. Just a few weeks before, a daughter of Chief Festus Okotie-Eboh had obtained my number and called me angrily over a BusinessDay column…

Press Release For immediate release, TUESDAY 10TH NOVEMBER 2020 THE FATHERLAND GROUP   STATEMENT ON THE LAGOS STATE GOVERNMENT’S JUDICIAL PANEL OF INQUIRY INTO THE LEKKI MASSACRE Background On Tuesday 20th October, a number of civilians were massacred by members of the Nigerian armed forces at a peaceful demonstration calling for an end to police brutality, #ENDSARS, at the Lekki Tollgate. The incident attracted worldwide condemnation and triggered international demonstrations with calls for the perpetrators to be identified and held to account. None of the state actors has yet accepted responsibility for the incident. Instead there has been an orchestrated campaign of denials: the Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sano-Olu denied that fatalities had occurred; the Nigerian Army denied that its soldiers were present at the location, let alone being involved in the massacre, and that reports suggesting otherwise were “Fake news”. Following an…

Press Release For immediate release, TUESDAY 27TH OCTOBER 2020, 7.00 PM THE FATHERLAND GROUP https://youtu.be/tBKAVVhhgcE STATEMENT ON THE LEKKI MASSACRE On Friday 16th October, 2020, the Fatherland Group issued a statement on the ENDSARS protests, then taking place in many parts of the country, in which we called for the removal from office of the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, as a necessary first step to rebuilding public confidence in the Nigerian Police Force. This simple step was not taken and the protests continued. We believe that had our call been heeded, the massacre, which occurred exactly a week to this day, would most likely not have occurred. The protests had all the while been peaceful, with disciplined organization and a noticeably high level of female participation. That was until a violent streak was introduced when sponsored agents began to attack the peaceful…

Press Release For immediate release, THURSDAY 15TH OCTOBER 2020 THE FATHERLAND GROUP STATEMENT ON THE #ENDSARS PROTESTS IN NIGERIA On 1st October 2020, Nigeria marked the 60th anniversary of its grant of Independence from British colonial rule. In his celebratory speech, the President, General Muhammadu Buhari, said amongst other things: “As a government, we remain committed to our constitutional oath of securing the lives and properties of the citizenry. I, however, call on the citizenry to also support government by providing the necessary community level intelligence in addressing these challenges”.Two days later, on 3rd of October 2020, officers of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) murdered a 20 year old singer, Daniel Chibuike Ikeaguchi, popularly known as Sleek. In another outrage, Ifeoma Abugu, a 20 year old lady, who had just graduated and was performing her mandatory National Youth Service, was arrested in place of…

Welcome to the October 2020 edition of The Fatherland, a magazine which speaks to the past, the present and the future of the people of Nigeria, and of those removed. To access The Fatherland Magazine, please choose from the following 2 options: Option 1 (For an Online Experience): Please click this option to read online at flipsnack’s website. https://www.flipsnack.com/thefatherlandgroup/the-fatherland-magazine-issue-2.html Option 2 (For Offline Reading): Please choose this option to download a PDF version of the magazine from the FATHERLAND.org (secure) website: Click here:https://fatherlandgroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/The-Fatherland.pdf

Dele Ogun: Sierra Leone Telegraph: 29 September 2020: This paper was delivered by Dele Ogun (Photo), Convenor of the Fatherland Group at the 19th anniversary celebration of the African Voice Newspaper on 19th September 2020. I was a boy of 7 when I came to Britain in 1969 from my [Read More] Dele Ogun: Sierra Leone Telegraph: 29 September 2020: This paper was delivered by Dele Ogun (Photo), Convenor of the Fatherland Group at the 19th anniversary celebration of the African Voice Newspaper on 19th September 2020. I was a boy of 7 when I came to Britain in 1969 from my home in Nigeria. I was part of the tail end of the Windrush Generation. I never imagined that 50 years on I would still be here. It was never the plan my parents had for me nor the dream that I harboured for myself.…

Background The practice of law in Nigeria is regulated by the Legal Practitioners Act 1990. The Nigerian Bar Association is the professional association of legal practitioners in Nigeria with a membership of over 120,000 lawyers across the country. The motto of the NBA which appears on its corporate seal is: Promoting the Rule of Law. Mr Abubakar Malami SAN is the Attorney General of the Federation and the Minister of Justice of Nigeria. He is also a member of the Nigerian Bar Association. The Legal Practitioners Act 1990 established an entity known as the General Council of the Bar (the Bar Council) to be responsible for the general management of the affairs of the Nigerian Bar Association. (section 1(1)) This power of general management includes the power to make rules for the professional conduct of legal practitioners. The current form of these rules are…

Background The National Water Resources Bill is a proposed Act of the Nigerian National Assembly the stated purpose of which is to “provide for the equitable, beneficial, efficient and sustainable development, management, use and conservation of Nigeria’s surface and groundwater resources . . . and other matters connected thereto”. To this end it introduces the following regime: “All surface water and ground water, wherever it occurs, is a resource common to all people”. (section 2(1)) “the right to use, manage and control all surface water and groundwater affecting more than one state . . . together with the beds and banks thereof, is vested in the Government of the Federation”. (section 2(3)) “the Federal Government is the public trustee of the nation’s water resources”. (section 2(4)) “. . . the use of water shall be subject to licensing provisions” (section 96)

Background The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is the professional association of legal practitioners in Nigeria with a membership of over 120,000 lawyers across the country. It is a body “engaged in the promotion and protection of human rights, the rule of law and good governance in Nigeria”.Following widespread domestic concerns over renewed inter-religious-ethnic killings in Kaduna State, on 20 August, 2020, the NBA took the decision to “dis-invite”, the Governor of Kaduna State from speaking at its 2020 Annual General Conference which is scheduled to hold from 26th to 29th August, 2020. The organisation came to this position having made the judgment that “it was not in the best interests of the Association to be engulfed in the controversy that has trailed the invitation of Mallam el-Rufai for the Conference”.Kaduna State is one of the 36 States into which Nigeria is divided under the…

Background Dr Obadiah Mailafiya is an economist who is a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria and was a candidate for the office of President in the 2019 Presidential Elections. He holds a PhD from the University of Oxford. https://youtu.be/p54IJuNg9JY On Monday 10, August 2020, Dr Mailafiya gave an interview on the ongoing killings in Southern Kaduna to a Nigerian radio station, Nigeria Info 99.3FM. In the course of the interview, he made the following comments and revelations: that the immediate crisis dates back to 2018 when the king of his community, Adara land, was ambushed on returning from a meeting with the State Governor Mallam Ahmed El Rufai; that in the course of that ambush the king’s wife was raped in his presence before he was brutally murdered after taking a ransom;that the current cycle of killings of his people…

The Fatherland Magazine - August 2020 Edition Welcome to the first edition of The Fatherland, a ground-breaking magazine which speaks to the past, the present and the future of the people of Nigeria, and of those removed. To access The Fatherland Magazine, please choose from the following 2 options: Option 1 (For an Online Experience): Please click this option to read online at flipsnack’s website. https://www.flipsnack.com/fatherland/the-fatherland.html Option 2 (For Offline Reading): Please choose this option to download a PDF version of the magazine from the FATHERLAND.org (secure) website: Click here:https://fatherlandgroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/The-Fatherland.pdf

Statement It is a matter of concern to the Fatherland Group that the Supreme Court, by its decision of 14 January 2020, endorsed an outcome in which the choice of the five million people of Imo State as to the Governorshi p of their state for the next four years was determined by a presumption of law that elections took place in 388 polling units within the State regardless of the reality. The Fatherland Group believed that it is in the field of democratic rights that society can least afford for disputes to be determined by legal technicalities of presumptions of law and facts, burdens of proof and points of pleadings. The group notes that the outcome of this case, and therefore the elections, turned on different views taken by different judges of the pleadings prepared by the lawyers for the parties. Substantive justice…