Category: Letters

Sir: I laughed when I read the report by the multinational consulting firm KPMG, which projected Nigeria’s unemployment rate to hit 41 percent this year. But on second thoughts, I decided to write about it because of the impact this misinformation about the unemployment rate would have on the citizenry, and the nation’s image.

KPMG is a foreign organisation. In most technological and industrialised nations, the employment rate is determined by taxation. So, if 80 percent of the population pays taxes, it means that 80 percent of the population are employed.

In Nigeria, it is not so. There are millions of citizens who earn money and pay zero taxes. The people who pay taxes in Nigeria are mostly business owners, and public and private sector workers. Many who hustle are erroneously tagged as unemployed because they do not pay taxes to the government. In this category, we have freelancers, people who do remote jobs, content creators, and people using their talents and skills to profit in one form or another. Some of these individuals earn far more than people who do public and private sector jobs but because they do not pay taxes to the government, they will be tagged as unemployed.

Unemployment statistics by foreign organisations like KPMG tends to capture mostly individuals in the formal sector of the economy. What about the informal sector where billions of naira change hands daily? Market men and women, shop owners, mechanics, bus conductors, bus drivers, and agberos are examples of people operating in the informal sector who would otherwise be tagged as unemployed even though some of them earn so much money on a daily basis that enables them to live comfortably.

Nigeria’s problem is not unemployment but underemployment. Nigerians are creative, industrious, and hardworking people and it is impossible that millions of youths will sit down at home and fold their hands doing nothing. If this was the case, there would be social unrest as hunger would push many into the streets in protests. However, just because they are yet to get their dream jobs, or they are doing something totally at variance with what they studied in school, many will tag themselves as unemployed.

•Peter Ovie Akus,  

New Jersey, USA.

Sir: Cervical cancer, which is the fourth most common cancer, is a kind of cancer that happens when cervical cells become abnormal and out of control over time. These cancer cells invade deep into the cervical tissue. If it progresses, cancer cells can spread to different organs in the body.

According to WHO, in 2018, an estimated 570,000 women were diagnosed with cervical cancer globally and approximately 311,000 women died from the disease. In 2020, an estimated 604,000 new cases and 342,000 deaths were also recorded.

Cervical cancer cases are known to be associated with high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPV) infection. The virus is transmitted through skin-to-skin contact and additionally through sexual intercourse. This is the same virus that causes genital warts. There are over 100 different strains of HPV; however, HPV- 16 and HPV- 18 alone cause cervical cancer.

Most instances of cervical cancer are prompted by HPV infection. HPV is a virus that penetrates the cervical cells and changes them. Some HPV types are associated with cervical, vulva, vaginal, penile, anal, mouth and throat cancers. The types of HPV that cause cancer are known as ‘’high risk types.’’  HPV is very common and without getting tested, people do not even know they are infected because early HPV infections often do not come with symptoms.

This also applies to cervical cancer as many Nigerian women with this disease do not realise early on because this, just like HPV, does not also cause symptoms until late in the disease, and most times the symptoms appear, they can easily be mistaken for common conditions such as menstrual bleeding or urinary tract infections (UTIs), back pain, bone fractures, fatigue, heavy vaginal bleeding, urine leakage, leg pain, loss of appetite, and pelvic pain.

Very few women with HPV types are at high risk of developing cervical cancer. Most HPV infections clear up on their own because of the body’s natural ability to fight infections. When they are gone, the cells return to normal. In a minority of women, HPV infection persists for a long period of time, it is called a persistent infection. High risk types of persistent HPV infection can cause more severe changes in cervical cells, and these changes that persist for one or two years are more likely to turn into cancer if left untreated

Many of us do not know how dangerous cervical cancer is and its symptoms being mistaken for something else makes it even more dangerous. 

But it can be prevented, and this is where cervical cancer screening becomes very important. Cervical cancer screening is used to find changes in the cells of the cervix that could lead to cancer and this screening includes cervical cytology (also called the Pap test or Pap smear) and testing for human papillomavirus (HPV).

To maintain good health, it is important to have regular pelvic examinations. An important part of this pelvic examination is a test called a Pap smear to detect the life-threatening disease of cervical cancer before it starts. Early detection of cervical cancer increases the chances of treatment, prolongs survival, and improves quality of life. The good news is that even when it is diagnosed at late stages, it can still be controlled with appropriate treatment and palliative care.

Many Nigerian women do not know about this cancer. It is therefore suggested that awareness of cervical cancer should be raised to educate women about the risks of untreated infection, and women should be encouraged to go for periodic check-ups.

Cervical cancer prevention must be multidisciplinary, incorporating elements of community education, social mobilisation, vaccination, screening, treatment.

 It is advisable for people who are of the age from 25 to 49 to do cervical cancer screening at least every 3 years, and for people who are from the age of 50 to 64 to do this screening at least every 5 years because most cervical cancers develop between these ages. To be safe completely from cervical cancer it is important to keep getting tested until at least 65 years of age. 

•Claire Nwachukwu, 

Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), Nigeria.

Sir: The 2023 elections have come and gone. There have been mixed reactions to the declared results of the elections. However, the discourses have sometimes focused on the wrong narratives. I am using this medium to appeal to all Nigerians to give peace a chance and embrace constructive discourses. My points are as highlighted below.

2023 Pre-election: The discourses were unfortunately reduced to issues of religious differences, same-faith ticket and ethnicity in the midst of different challenges requiring national focus, unity and suggestions for moving the nation towards prosperity. Some focused extensively on Christians and Muslims without thinking of African Traditional Religion adherents, Atheists, Animists and even those less concerned about any faith or creed – a case of tyranny of the majority. Of course, there is nothing wrong in appreciating issues of diversity but such divisive issues should not replace constructive discourses. The market prices do not discriminate between adherents of faith, and do not recognise ethnic backgrounds. Hence, we should always place emphasis on who can deliver the dividends of democracy and entrench good governance.

2023 Post-election: The voting procedures include BVAS accreditation of voters, manual ballot voting, manual vote counting, manual collation of results in the presence of voters and polling agents of political parties, manual signing of voting results by INEC officials and polling agents of political parties, and uploading of the signed results sheets on INEC IREV. At each level, from the polling units through the local government areas and states, all results are collated in the presence of party agents and INEC officials. With these procedures, any political party that does not agree with declared results have the results from polling units to present for re-dress. Yet there were several discourses on BVAS votes and BVAS electronic transmission of votes, even when such do not exist. What we can do is to further debate feasibility issues of electronic voting and electronic transmission of results in future elections.

There have also been clear misrepresentations of facts with some claiming that the non-uploading of results of the presidential election in real time affected the credibility of the results. This is not true as the results from the polling units are available to polling agents of all political parties who also have the opportunities to point out any discrepancy at the different levels of collation of results i.e., from the polling units through the local government areas and states to the federal capital territory. That several sitting governors lost their senatorial bids confirm the credibility of the elections. That the ruling party lost states such as Katsina and Lagos where the President and President-elect come from respectively confirm further that the elections were credible. It must also be noted that election results could not have been rigged in the North in favour of a presidential candidate from the South against a Northern prominent and established former Vice President.  Clearly, the North reciprocated the kind gesture of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’s support for President Buhari in 2015, and decided to vote for a power shift to the South. The President-elect ultimately scored the highest votes in the North West, North Central and South West regions and came second in the remaining geo-political regions confirming the national spread of his support base.

We should respect differences of opinions and allow discourses to be on pointing out challenges where there are, and suggesting a way forward.

Today, elections have been concluded, and matters arising were referred to the courts, let the courts resolve matters arising, let’s give peace a chance, and let’s have hope that the incoming administration will lead Nigeria forward.

•Prof. Adelaja Akinlolu,

Otukpo, Benue State.

Sir: In a democratic setting, the first model to adopt and devote our energy to is the conceptual model of competence, which everyone requires to participate effectively in a culture of modern democracy if we’re ever ready to progress as a nation.

 It’s unethical for the vice chairman Northwest of the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC) to be sentimental in his choice of words regarding who should be elected as the president of the 10th Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Even though, as a member of the National Working Committee, he’s entitled to his opinion, it, however, does not reflect the yearnings, position or aspirations of the Nigerian populace.

Democracy is, of course, built on institutions and laws, and democratic culture is expected to evolve through the actions and behaviours of citizens.

Today, Nigeria as a nation faces different challenges that require immediate solutions through proper legislation, which, of course, can only be guaranteed by a competent hand that is not only capable but also has the wherewithal to turn things around for the better, irrespective of his region or religious notions. Such a person must be equal to the task.

As our nation continues to grow and mature in a democratic setting and the politics of negotiations, what have you brought to the table before you demand anything in return?  That should become ever more important than emotion. To navigate a world where not everyone holds the same views, we each must uphold democratic principles by allowing a level playing field.

At the same time, you can’t negate the fact that the Northwest played a significant role in bringing this government to power; therefore, it has every right to demand the position of the number three citizen.

The most unethical comment is to dictate who should have a certain position without expending energy on it. Why should you reap the fruits of someone else’s labour?

You can only demand a fair deal in terms of government resources, not position.  Let realistic parameters be the yardstick for discourse, not religious sentiment. Every fit Nigerian should be considered.

•Tajuddeen Ahmad Tijjani,

 Bauchi State.

Sir: I write in response to recent remarks made by the former Director General of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Arunma Oteh, at an event in Abuja, where she bemoaned Nigeria’s rising debt profile.

According to Reuters, Nigeria’s total public debt is projected to rise to N77 trillion this year from N44 trillion as at September last year due to new borrowings. This gives cause for alarm. We have returned to the pre-Obasanjo years when we had huge debts and spent a huge chunk of our income servicing those debts annually before we secured debt relief.

While not all of our public debt has been incurred by this administration, we cannot totally absolve it of blame because instead of reducing our debt profile, it was escalated.

In a country where 133 million people are multidimensionally poor, it is sad to note that a huge chunk of government revenue that could have been spent on infrastructure and the provision of social services to the poor and vulnerable, is spent on servicing debt.

Continuous borrowing will spell doom for generations unborn who will be saddled with huge debts that they cannot pay, and would be unable to service. It would also destroy the nation’s credit worthiness in the international financial community which would make her unable to secure new loans, no matter how pressing her needs may be. This could lead to social unrest especially when the government cannot pay wages and provide social services. Nigeria should learn from Greece which is yet to heal from the economic crisis which began 14 years ago due to huge debts which she was unable to pay or service.

The incoming administration has its work cut out for it. There are four things it needs to do. One, it should involve more of the private sector in the building of infrastructure instead of using loans. This can be done through build-operate-transfer (BOT), public-private partnership (PPP), tax credits, etc. Two, we need to put a total stop to subsidy payments for petroleum products. Three, we need to reduce the bureaucracy by eliminating multiple government agencies who perform the same functions. For example, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) are both doing the same job, so one has to give way for the other if we are serious about cutting the cost of governance. Lastly, the collection of Value Added Tax (VAT) should be the exclusive preserve of sub-national governments. This would reduce our overall debt burden as state governments are significant contributors to our total public debt.

•Peter Ovie Akus,  

New Jersey, USA.

SIR: When we started the Feed the Hungry project, we were not fully familiar with the grim reality of how a toxic cocktail of conflict, climate change, and government’s failure to provide basic amenities has already left millions of people in Africa exposed to food price shocks and vulnerable to further crises. We just wanted to see hungry people smile by providing food for them. As I landed in Kigali in advance for the African Heritage Award in recognition of our work in the zero-hunger space, alongside former President Goodluck Jonathan and other distinguished African leaders in different spheres, I couldn’t but ponder on the paradox of plenty and why Africa should be poor and hungry.  There is no doubt that with the increasing food crisis, our food systems in their current form are inadequate for the task of sustainably ending poverty and hunger. This is especially true in countries that face the highest rates of undernourishment, child wasting, stunting, and child mortality due to malnutrition. Why have our food systems become inadequate to ensure that hunger is reduced? According to the 2022 Global Hunger Index, out of 54 countries, 37 African countries have levels of hunger that rate “Serious” or higher. Four countries in Africa rank among the hungriest: Chad, Madagascar and DRC all rank at “Alarming” levels of hunger in the 2022 GHI. There are some other countries with incomplete data for 2022 but assumed to be in the “alarming” range, such as Burundi, South Sudan and Somalia. Last year, Somalia ranked as the world’s hungriest country with the only “Extremely Alarming” GHI ranking.

The question is – why is Africa faced with hunger when it can feed the world? This question finds bearing with plethora of social challenges like poverty, inequality, conflict, political instability, and climate change. Almost all these issues are man-made. There are however no shortcuts to complex challenges, a substantive response towards changing the broken food system is for governments to invest in critical infrastructure within the food system, including security. Such infrastructure investment must go beyond national interventions, regional leadership is required, like the West African Agriculture Productivity Programme (WAAPP), a joint initiative of ECOWAS and the World Bank which deals with agricultural technology. But it is not enough to initiate these projects, sustainable results are needed. In West Africa alone, there are many agricultural projects with the main objective to promote food and nutrition security in all the 15 member states and at the same time, contribute to the process of regional economic integration. 

Governments at all levels have a duty to connect small-scale farmers to local markets while providing them with the resources to improve production, reduce their post-harvest losses, develop business skills and gain access to financial tools. More importantly, work to eliminate food loss and waste by providing farmers with modern storage equipment like silos and air-tight bags; offer long-lasting foods like flour, dried beans and salt – all properly packaged in sturdy containers; and invest in innovations like hydroponics that allow communities to grow, sell and store food in the harshest conditions. 

At the national level, the right to food by every citizen is a critical component of achieving zero hunger. The right to food protects the right of all human beings to be free from hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition. The right to food, and its variations, is a human right protecting the right of people to feed themselves in dignity, implying that sufficient food is available, that people have the means to access it, and that it adequately meets the individual’s dietary needs. 

The Kigali consensus is that ending hunger and poverty in Africa is not a one-way traffic nor a one-off thing for heroic records, Africa needs shared responsibility to achieve shared prosperity. Corporate social responsibilities from corporations must be impact driven rather than just for the record; the government’s implementation of policies targeted at zero hunger and our collective commitments must go beyond the thin drops of tokenism. A hunger-free continent is possible but we must build it now.

•Emmanuel Nnamdi Osadebay,

Executive Director, T200 Foundation 

SIR: The open letter from Chimamanda Adichie to US President Joe Biden is ill-advised and fraught with self-contradiction. 

Nothing in her long, windy story reflects that she took time off to observe the elections.

When she is not relying on one relative here, she is citing one cousin there. 

In other words, she relied on secondary bias and hearsay to fly a letter addressing serious election concerns to the leader of another nation.  

Is she the only one whose family has a close relationship with Peter Obi, or must she abuse the mileage gained in the artistic field for momentary emotional pursuits?

And pray, since she lives in America, Nigeria must be subordinated to that country? 

I guess she is not current with the changing global balance of power and is entrapped in the old thoughts that in the unlikely event of America listening to her on the eve of another election, the President Bola Tinubu Government will have legitimacy issues.

She just deceived herself, possibly addressing issues as she did in the land conflict between Abba, her hometown and their Ukpo big neighbours.

There is so little any single person can do from the armchair, armed with only a pretty face and pretty prose without a grasp of the Nigerian Electoral Process, let alone its polity and attendant complications.

There are really no specifics in that letter that relates to issues that can invalidate an election within Nigerian statutes. 

So, if it is outside Nigerian statute, what is the big idea? Biden should evoke American values and laws and issue instructions to their ‘colony’? 

That is far-fetched!

 America, whose president is being queried for his country’s congratulations to Nigeria on 2023 elections, has more information, more varied perspectives, and in greater balance than Chimamanda’s piece could offer. 

They had observers on the ground to complement the efforts of their mission in Nigeria. 

And to crown it all, this open letter comes at a time when the candidate Chimamanda confesses support for, and the party on whose platform he was voted, have already approached the Election Petitions Tribunal on three out of four grounds allowed by law. 

Something is not adding up. 

But perhaps we can discuss this again on May 30, 2023 so we can distinguish Nigerian literary ambassadors from aspiring ‘American Colonial Secretaries.’

•Okelo Madukaife,

Anambra State Publicity Secretary of All Progressives Congress (APC) 

SIR:  In today’s digital world, data is key to the extent that some scholars have termed ‘data as the new oil’. This speaks to the huge revenue potential data has for every country serious about growing her digital economy. Nigeria is certainly one. This data is in the form of personal information which is frequently collected, stored, and shared by businesses, governments, and individuals.

However, without clear regulations to govern the use of such data, individuals and entities are left vulnerable to privacy violations such as data breaches, identity theft, and other forms of abuse. Today, it is a global best practice to have a data protection law in place, otherwise nations find it difficult to attract so many interventions beneficial to their countries. A data-secured environment is an investment wonderland. This explains why many development partners, international financial institutions, critical stakeholders in the digital economy space and even potential investors today have continued to ask questions as to why Nigeria does not have a data protection law in place. Having such a law in place will align the country with scores of others around the globe and make Nigeria a global player. Put differently, the costs of a lack of a proper data protection law are enormous.

To address this issue, the federal government established the Nigeria Data Protection Bureau (NDPB) in 2022, to ensure that people’s personal information is kept private and safe when used for ‘digital things.’ In January , the Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved the Nigeria Data Protection Bill presented by the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy for transmission to the National Assembly for consideration. The draft data protection Bill was sent to the National Assembly by the president in separate letters addressed to the leadership of the National Assembly. The Bill has gone through the first and second reading and sent to the ‘Committee of Whole’ in the National Assembly to harmonize.  This Bill will provide a legal framework for the protection of personal information, safeguard people’s basic rights and freedoms, and establish a data protection commission for the regulation of processing of personal information and data when passed into law.

The Draft Data Protection Bill was previously passed by the eighth Assembly, but President Muhammadu Buhari declined assent. This was due to concerns raised by stakeholders on some identified areas and clauses in the Bill.

The current National Assembly needs to pass the data protection bill for President Buhari to assent to it before May 29. This will provide additional layer of protection for the nation’s digital identity ecosystem and in no small measure safeguard the nation’s fast growing digital economy, boost investor’s confidence, attract foreign direct investment, improve our GDP, and ensure robust protection and safeguarding of personal information from being stolen and misused for fraudulent purposes, reducing the incidence of identity theft and fraud as well as serve as a buffer for citizens’ personal data privacy.

Data is critical to the survival of every nation’s economy particularly in todays digitized global home. It is on record that Nigeria is the first African country to join the developed countries in celebrating international data privacy day. This demonstrates the nation’s drive and willingness to take its pride of place as a leading African digital economy hub amongst the comity of nations.

The current Assembly should take due credit and ensure the speedy passage of this lofty bill, and President Buhari should quickly assent to it for the good of posterity. For, the passage of a comprehensive data protection law in Nigeria is urgent and should not be delayed any further.

•Muhammad Mikail,

 Abuja.

SIR: The post-election conversations have been a putrid salad of prejudices, recriminations, and elevated provincialism. Our wits, resolve, temperance, capacitance, and stability threshold as a nation are being tested, and they will be tested further in the months and years ahead.

Our history is always ready ammunition to be dispatched in any ethnic combat in that ungoverned social media neighbourhood. Contending sides launch missiles from the war rooms with their own ‘droppings’ of history.

The truth is, history is subjective. Every group has their own version of history – as regards their social and political existence in Nigeria. But we cannot keep recycling the epics of woes that have bogged us down as a people. We must move forward and look forward.

Nigeria’s past is not a very glossy one, yes. It is replete with tales of pain, sorrow, and blood – depending on who is telling the story. Fatal mistakes were made, but must we keep reliving the errors of our past? Are we doomed to remain a rendition of our past? Can we not move forward – beyond our past?

Nothing changes because the old ways remain the same. We must think a new Nigeria, and a new Nigeria begins with new progressive thinking. We cannot take a leap into a glorious future while we are still stuck in the rut of the past. Our past has become today’s pain, and tomorrow’s burden.

But does this imply we must abandon our history? Absolutely not. We embrace it, but learn from it as well, and stop repeating the same mistakes. The current confusion shows we have learnt nothing from our chequered history.

Our past should teach us to be respectful of one another; it should teach us caution; it should teach us tolerance; it should teach us understanding; it should teach discipline, and it should teach us the very essence of unity.

Like Sir Ahmadu Bello, Sardauna of Sokoto, said to Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe: ‘’Let us understand our differences. I am a Muslim and a northerner. You are a Christian, an easterner. By understanding our differences, we can build unity in our country.”

We must manage our diversity with ‘care, mutual respect, understanding, caution and trembling’. We cannot discount our points of divergence, but we must also recognise that we have solid arcs of convergence. What unites us should be stronger than what divides us.

It is unfortunate that to reinforce prejudices, some deploy self-archived ahistorical accounts. Our past as a country should not be a springboard for hate exchanges, but a source of learning to forge a better country. We hold on to “history”, whether manufactured or inverted, to accent our biases. Evolving means we are better than yesterday.

No one can hold their own version of history as truth everyone must chow down. There are villains and heroes in every story. It is depressing that our much-vaunted past has become stuff of propaganda passed down from one generation to another. Hate transitioning from one generation to another. We must break this circle of hostility.

Really, we cannot make progress as a country if we remain on this treadmill. We must sanitise our conversations, discard epithets, and evolve into a wholesome whole.

We must deconstruct revisionist fabrications and pretensions to make good of the future. Knowing that we started off on a shaky foundation should thrust us into consciously working out our destiny. We dissipate so much energy on ethnic bouts of supremacy but leave very little to interrogate fundamental issues of governance. We must make our existence as a nation about jutting issues that govern our lives as citizens – economy, security, education, and health.

It is insalubrious to ascribe the actions of deviants within a certain pool to any group. I have maintained this position since the wave of baleful propaganda against the Fulani. I will not deviate from the path of unity and peacebuilding no matter how perilous the road becomes.

The invidious and menacing enterprise of Peter Obi’s ‘Obidients’ has driven the dagger deep into the national umbilicus. Sore points quickened, passions inflamed, and bottled-up emotions unlatched.

We need to address the Obidient menace full-frontal, and we need to strengthen national and community concord. We need new ententes brokered for national cohesion or unity. We need to talk. We need to have those difficult conversations in civilised and decorous fora with a view to healing our nation. We need to talk with one another, not at each other.

•Fredrick Nwabufo,

 <fredricknwabufo@yahoo.com

•Court awards amputee shot by Amotekun officer N30m instead of N2m he initially asked for

In his pursuit of justice, Oluwasegun Oluwarotimi, a 36-year-old former commercial motorcyclist, was recently victorious against the Ondo State Security Network Agency, known as Amotekun Corps, whose officer had shot him in the left leg, which was eventually amputated.   The Ondo State High Court, presided over by Justice O.M. Adejumo, on March 29, ordered the Ondo State Government to pay him N30m as damages. The security outfit is owned by the state government.

His story is a mix showing abuse of power, violation of human rights, callous neglect and cover-up. According to a statement issued by his lawyer, Tope Temokun, “On the 9th day of August, 2021 between 8:00am-9:00am when in the course of his daily hustle as an ‘okada’ rider, he took a passenger to Araromi, Akure, and when the passenger alighted from his ‘okada’ and gave him a N500 note, he had to look for his “change.”

“It was around this time that an Amotekun Corps pickup van drove in, swerved towards where he parked his motorcycle by the roadside and some uniformed Amotekun officers disembarked from the vehicle and fired gunshots into the air which caused fear amongst those around and caused people to start running.” This was the situation when an Amotekun officer shot him in the leg, the lawyer said.  

“He suffered bleeding for about nine hours and was eventually taken by the Amotekun Corps to the Federal Medical Centre, Owo, where he was attended to briefly but could not really be given serious medical attention because of the ongoing strike action of the doctors at the time.

“He said he was in this painful condition, in tears every day, till Saturday, the 14th day of August, 2021 when his mother suddenly showed up and said that she had been looking for him since Monday the 9th of August, 2021. He was taken away from the FMC Owo and operated at a private hospital where his decomposing leg was cut off.”

After his leg was amputated, he sought N2m compensation from the Amotekun Corps, but the security agency was reported to have accused him of aiding the escape of a principal suspect in a case of kidnapping, armed robbery and car snatching, and attempting to snatch the rifle of one of its officers. Also, the agency was said to have described his demand for compensation as tantamount to blackmail. He described the allegation against him as “a wicked lie.”

He went to court in October 2022, more than a year after the incident, following the refusal of the Amotekun Corps and the state government to investigate the matter in order to ascertain the truth. He sued them, asking for N50m as general damages and N50m as exemplary damages. His lawyer said “the court condemned in the strongest terms the illegal shooting of the applicant in the leg that led to the amputation of his leg.”

The Ondo State Government should, without delay, comply with the judgement of the court by paying him the judgement sum of N30m. That is the honourable thing to do, instead of pursuing an appeal against the judgement, which would only prolong the matter after the truth had been established.  

Although an appeal “is a constitutional right and legally exercisable by any judgement debtor,” the amputee’s lawyer said in a letter addressed to Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu (SAN), he appealed to the governor to ensure that the payment is made so that Oluwasegun “could start to pick up the pieces of his life.”

“He is now in a state of total privation and depression consequent upon which his two children had to drop out of school and his wife abandoned him and remarried to another man,” the lawyer explained.  

The court judgement is commendable. It should serve as a deterrent to officers of the security agency. But the particular officer who recklessly fired the shot that caused the damage should also be punished to reinforce the message against abuse of power.

‘The Ondo State Government should, without delay, comply with the judgement of the court by paying him the judgement sum of N30m. That is the honourable thing to do’