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Tag: protests

  • Protests in Rivers, Kwara

    Protests in Rivers, Kwara

    MORE protests were staged yesterday over the abduction of schoolgirls in Borno State.

    There were protests in Port Harcourt and Ilorin .

    In Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi promised to support his Borno State counterpart, Alhaji Kashim Shettima, to ensure the release of the abducted girls.

    The protesters, who converged on the Isaac Boro Park, carried placards, and banners with inscriptions, such as: “Destroy the beast, Boko Haram now”; “Bring back our girls”; “Give us back our future”; and “Borno elders, Federal Government all parties involved”.

    The Protesters, led by the Executive Director, Niger Delta Civil Society Coalition, Mr. Anyakwe Nsrimovu on the Federal Government to ensure the girls’ release.

    Receiving the protesters at the Government House, Port Harcourt, the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Mr. George Feyii, who represented the governor promised that the message would be conveyed to the Presidency.

    Feyii said Amaechi would support the efforts to ensure that the girls were released to their families.

    In a letter to President Goodluck Jonathan, sent through Amaechi, the protesters expressed fear over the security challenges in the country, appealing that the government should not allow the nation slip into anarchy.

    “We are worried that these are Nigerian children seeking education, seeking an opportunity for a better future for our dear country. Their enrolment in Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, was not just about their immediate families and Chibok community, but about our dear nation.

    “We are worried that among these abducted children are future ministers, future administrators, entrepreneurs and, perhaps, Nigeria’s first female president. We are worried that none of them may be released, if we do nothing now to find, rescue and protect those innocent girls.”

    Women, under the aegis of Coalition of Women Associations (COWAS), in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital, staged a peaceful protest to solidarise with the parents of the abducted schoolgirls.

    The protesters converged on the premises of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) Press Centre on Offa Road.

    The coalition comprises Community-Based Organisations (CBOs), Faith-Based Organisations (FBOs), women journalists and women organisations.

    From the NUJ Press Centre, they marched to the Government House, where they were received by Deputy Governor Peter Kishira. The placard carrying women also presented a letter to the deputy governor for transmission to President Jonathan.

    From the Government House, they moved to  the Emir of Ilorin’s palace and the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) secretariat.

    Some of the placards read: “Every child counts regardless of her background”, “We are here to know the fate of our children”; “Do not allow those children to be used as instruments of baby making”; “Oh Allah, save us from unjust leaders”; “Stop killing innocent souls to settle scores”; and “Education is the bedrock of any society”.

    Addressing the women on behalf of Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed, Kishira said: “I have personally appeared before you to receive you on this occasion, which is a demonstration of concern about what has happened to our country. I believe I am speaking to women who are experienced. Because you can imagine, at our age, definitely when we speak on matters like this, we are talking from experience. I lost my first daughter in 1980. So I know what it takes to lose a child.

    “Those parents who are here and who have that experience know that it is an experience you never forget. I agree with you on behalf of the governor, who is also a parent, that there is nobody who is a Nigerian, who will not feel it, with respect to what has happened our daughters.

    “I want to assure you that your messages will get to the right quarters. The President had already spoken. He is also concerned and we believe with all our efforts and prayers, the girls will be rescued. Because when you have this kind of experience you have nobody to depend on, except God.”

    Presenting the letter of protest, Coordinator Bileqees Oladimeji said:  “As a mother, I know the situation in which parents of these girls are: talk of the trauma, the mental torture and the sleepless nights. Mothers are bound to remember the pain of carrying the babies for nine months in their wombs; the pain at labour and delivery. Talk of how mothers will continually imagine the cries of their children shouting for help but without hope. Imagine what these children will be thinking, that they have been abandoned by their country, the family and their parents.

    “Three weeks have passed, our government has not been able to do anything concrete in providing a positive sense of hope for the recovery of our own children. Many commentators accused us of being insensitive to the feelings of these children and they might be right, until something positive is obtained from our efforts, we would be seen as not doing anything.”

  • Protest in Abuja, Ibadan over abducted school girls

    Protest in Abuja, Ibadan over abducted school girls

    Hundreds of women defied yesterday a downpour to march on the National Assembly over the abduction of 234 girls from a secondary school in Chibok, Borno State.

    Since the girls were snatched away by Boko Haram on April 15, there has been no trace of their whereabouts.

    The women, many of who wore red dresses, carried placards with inscriptions, such as “Rescue our Chibok girls”; “Bring back our girls alive”; “Where are my sisters?” “Let peace and justice reign” and “Our daughters going for N2000”.

    Women also protested in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.

    The Abuja rally, which started around 3.30pm, was led by a tearful former Education Minister, Oby Ezekwesili, human rights activists Mariam Uwais and Saudatu Sani, among other leaders of various civil society groups.

    The Co-ordinator of the Human Rights Agenda Network, Hadiza Bala Usman,  said the reading from Chibok was that all Nigerians, including the military and the security personnel, “are at great risk of being consumed by the aggression of those who have ambushed the peace and security of peace and prosperity of Nigerians”.

    She added that the trend of conflicting information about the exact number of girls who are still missing  and even the operations are regrettable.

    The group lamented that the fact that no group had come out to claim responsibilty for the abduction of the girls has made it disturbing, stressing that this made it imperative for Nigerians to demand that those  with the responsibilty for the safety of all Nigerians should find and return the girls to their parents.

    The women raised some questions, including: “Where are our daughters and when will they be brought back home? How is it possible in the age of drones, google maps and aerial surveillance that over 200 girls will vanish without a trace?” “Is this suggestive of the weaknesses of security operations covering soft targets, such as schools even after clear indications of their vulnerability?

    “Why was protection for our children in the Northeast not intensified even after the devastation and pain of the 59 innocent children murdered in FGC Buni Yadi on February 25, 2014?

    “How is it that security is not upgraded around institutions even when warnings of potential threat or imminent aggressions are issued?”

    “What is the rational explanation that in a location in Borno State under the State of Emergency, four trucks and numerous motor bikes can deploy, move in a convoy, unleash terror on the school at Chibok and then flee with over 200 girls to a location yet to be determined?”

    Mrs. Ezekwesili said: “It began to look as if we as Nigerians are totally without empathy and I know that those of you who have turned out here are the symbol of the past of our countries that our country is not a country of people that are careless about their  fellow human beings”

    “We are so frustrated at the fact that 234 of our children would get missing and there is actually no coherent search and rescue going on concerning them…

    “Our leadership must show a presence of mind concerning the situation that will have with our daughters. How many of you saw the Chibok mothers on news?

    Isn’t that heart breaking? They felt that they have been abandoned by not just the government but by all of us; is it a good thing for  a citizen to feel that way.”

    She went on: “We want to compel the right type of momentum for the search and the discovery of those children and bringing them back. We don’t care about any stories on this. There must be concerted effort to bring back our girls. If one Nigeria girl is missing, it would be all of us that are missing, let alone 234 Nigerian girls missing.”

    Senate President David Mark, Speaker House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal  and Deputy Speaker  Emeka Ihedioha defied the heavy rainfall to receive the women at the outer gate of the National Assembly.

    The women defied the windy and heavy rainfall to protest the abduction of 234 school girls in Chibok, Borno State 17 days ago.

    Mark, Tambuwal and Ihedioha were heavily drenched too.

    The National Assembly had barely risen from its plenary session when the angry women stormed the complex.

    Mark stepped into the rain alongside other principal officers to address the protesting women.

    He lamented the continued  captivity of the girls, saying it had reached an unbearable stage.

    “We are drenched. Totally soaked in the rain. It is better to be beaten by the rain and get our children freed from their captors. If it means standing in the rain until the girls are freed we are prepared to do so.

    “We are lost of words. We can only apologise that it is taking this long to get these girls released. We are not going to rest until the last of the girls is freed.  All the security apparatus, all of us must get involved in this battle.  There is no mistaken the fact that we are in a state of war. With God on our side, we shall triumph over evil”.

  • Protesting youths seal off Edo NDDC office

    Staffers of the Niger Delta Development Commission in Edo State were Thursday locked inside their offices for several hours by protesting youths from 14 communities in Ovia North East Local Government Area of Edo State.

    The youths were protesting an abandoned rural electrification project by the NDDC to electrify their communities

    It was learnt that the electricity project was awarded 10 years ago.

    They said they took to the streets because they have waited for so long for their communities to be connected to the national grid.

    Some of the communities are oil producing communities in the local government.

    The youths said they came to seal NDDC office in Benin City after the expiration of a two weeks ultimatum given to the NDDC to complete the project.

    Leader of the protesters, Omaghomi Olu-Derimon, said communities such as Gelegele, Ikpoko,Eghudu,Evborokho, Ekewan, Ugbine have been in darkness after many years of the commencement of the project.

    According to him, “Oduna ward is historically linked to the famous 1897 Benin invasion where you will find the tomb of Captain James Philip and the wreckage of the boat which the whites used to enter the Benin Kingdom, without controversy, Oduna ward played host to the first indigenous oil company in Nigeria, Dubril Oil Company Limited with several oil wells.”

    “If there is not light, there will be no peace for NDDC. We are prepared to sleep in this NDDC office until the electricity is fixed. Many of the poles have fallen off and we are tired.”

    A senior staff of NDDC, Mr. Johnson Ikhinmwin pleaded with the protesters to give the commission three months to complete the project.

    He promised to take the protesters to NDDC headquarters in Port Harcourt if the project was not fixed within three months.

     

  • Kano PDP protests election guidelines

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Kano State yesterday said it will protest the alleged inconsistency by the State Independent Electoral Commission (KANSIEC) in the release of guidelines and timetable for the May 17 local government elections.

    At a briefing held at the home of former Governor Ibrahim Shekarau, the party insisted that going by the prevailing situation on ground, KANSIEC may not be able to organise free and fair elections, if imminent measures were not taken.

    Shekarau, who spoke on behalf of PDP leaders, said they would not be deterred from participating in the elections.

    “KANSIEC has deliberately refused to give PDP candidates clearance slips that will enable them pay for the forms in the banks.

    ‘’Despite all efforts by our candidates to obtain this form, they were told that the date has elapsed.’’

    Shekarau said PDP has written a formal protest letter to KANSIEC, stating all the irregularities and injustice, adding that the party will take constitutional actions to ensure that its candidates were protected and given equal opportunities to participate.

    Vice Chairman PDP Care-taker Committee Yahaya Bagobiri said: ‘’ On April 5, the party received a notice from KANSIEC that it had extended the sales of forms from the April 3 to April 4.

    ‘’The PDP candidates were discriminated against by KANSIEC in that they were subjected to a screening process before clearance slips were issued to them to facilitate the purchase of forms.”

  • Women Tax: More protests may rock Nnewi over tax

    Women Tax: More protests may rock Nnewi over tax

    Baring any hitch, thousands of market women at Agbo-Edo main market, Nkwo Nnewi, Anambra State may stage another protest over what they termed imposition of taxation Thursday.
    The women had locked up their shops and trooped to the streets of Nnewi to protest imposition of N4,800 tax on them by the leadership of the market in collaboration with the State government, but it was foiled by the Nigerian police.
    Divisional Police Officer of Nnewi Central Police Station, Mr Ikechukwu Egbochukwu led a police detachment to stop the protest which he said was illegal.
    The women had taken to Owerri Road from Nkwo Nnewi market chanting war songs and causing human and vehicular traffic as they headed for Nnewi North Council headquarters where they met police barricade at the entrance.
    Commissioner for commerce and Industry, Robert Okonkwo when contacted through his Public Relations Officer, Shedrack Nnanna said he would get back to  but never did as at press time.
    It was a sight to behold as nursing mothers with strapped babies at their back in the scorching sun and old women took to the streets.
    Spokesperson of the women identified as Mrs Chioma Jesus said that traders in the market, especially women, were over burdened with multiple levies in the market. She said that the most vexatious one was a recent imposition of N4,800 per trader in the market as tax no matter how small your business is.
    She said: “We face authoritarian leadership in the market. We are not given a breathing space at all. They said we should pay N4,800 this time per head. But we resist that even though they have vowed to deal with defaulters decisively as from next Monday. We want government to tell us why women should begin to pay tax in Anambra”.
    Concerned Traders of Agbo-Edo United Market Association led by Mr Christopher Osuojukwu also raised alarm over the high levy his members are paying. He enumerated stallage fee, development levy, sanitation and security levies, loading and unloading, parking, gate, among others as some of the fees the traders pay.
    Osuojukwu said: “After paying all these levies yet the market has no public convenience. Traders and customers urinate and excrete indiscriminately. There is no drainage system. And when it rains the result is that everywhere is flooded which is hazardous and injurious to health and can cause outbreak of epidemics’’.
    The women and concerned traders are of the opinion that current leadership of the market under Mr John Nwosu , having completed his second tenure should step aside for a new election.
    Nwosu however in his reaction on telephone said the tax in question was imposed by the State government uniformly in 52 markets across the State “and Agbo-Edo main market case will not be an exception.” He said he was only two years in his second tenure and would go when it expires.

  • Protests in Onitsha over kidnap

    Residents of Fegge community in Onitsha, Anambra State yesterday protested the continued detention of three kidnapped traders one year after they were abducted.

    The protesters wore black clothes and marched on the streets of Fegge.

    The victims are Messrs Vitus Ezekweme, Collins Ifezue and Ifeanyi Okoye.

    The Campaign for Democracy (CD) led the protesters, demanding the release of the men since their abductors have collected N5 million, N2.2 million and N2 million as ransom.

  • Nigerians face Indian boycott after protests

    Nigerians face Indian boycott after protests

    A COLLECTIVE of rent-a-bike operators in Goa, India, has resolved to boycott Nigerians and not accept their business, two days after a mob of Nigerians blocked a national highway and attacked locals and policemen.

    Spokesperson for the rent-a-bike operators in north Goa, Jalesh Raut, said that they had also put up signs all over Mapusa, a town 12 kms from Panaji, which says “No to drugs and No to Nigerians”.

    “We have decided not to rent out two wheelers to Nigerians after their attack on locals and police Thursday. They give us good business, but they cannot be beating our own people and policemen,” Raut said.

    Rent-a-bike is a unique scheme started by the Goa government a few years ago where tourists can rent a two wheeler. The bikes cost about Rs.250 per day and there are around 14,000 such vehicles.

    It was these bikes which the protesting Nigerians used to first overtake a police hearse van, smash the vehicle and forcibly extract the body of their murdered compatriot, Obina Obiwesi, before blockading National Highway 17.

    They were demanding the presence of their ambassador, claiming that Nigerians were being targeted by a local narcotics gang operating in Goa. They also claimed that the police were specifically targeting them on the instructions of the local drug gang.

    Raut also led a rally of rent-a-bike owners from Mapusa to Porvorim on the national highway urging residents not to lease houses or vehicles to Nigerians.

    “The Nigerians pose an open challenge to Goa. If 50 Nigerians can block a road for hours and even intimidate the police, something has to change in Goa,” he said.

    Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar ,speaking on the protest said the police could not rein in the protesters because of their huge sizes.

    “They are huge and aggressive. Some of them are seven feet tall. It would take at least 100 of our policemen to handle a crowd of 50 Nigerians,” Parrikar told reporters, when he was asked why the police force did not make any effort for nearly an hour to clear National Highway-17 that was blocked by heavily built Nigerians armed with hockey sticks, bamboos and knives.

    The Nigerians were demanding that the autopsy on Obina Obiwesi be conducted in the presence of the Nigerian ambassador in India.

    The murder, the Nigerian protestors claimed, had been committed by a gang called Chapora boys, a notorious underground drug mafia operating in north Goa, and the police had been unwilling to act against the alleged murderers, who were locals. They blocked the highway by dumping the corpse bang in the middle of the road after smashing open the police hearse and extracting the body from it.

    The brazen manner in which Goa Police officers were cowered down in public by a group of 50 well-built Nigerians (the mob later swelled to nearly 200) and Parrikar’s continued dogged defence of the state police has evoked an extremely strong reaction in the social media as well as among people across sections.

    The mob not only threatened and warded off over 20 policemen, including Superintendent of Police (North) Priyanka Kashyap, but also told the latter off in a verbal duel.

    The intimidation was such that Parrikar, himself claimed that he saw one “herculesque Nigerian” who he believed would need 10 Goa policemen to control.

    “He was nearly seven feet. He would have needed at least 10 policemen to control,” said Parrikar, who is also the state’s home minister.

    The chief minister also said that he had inherited a corrupt and ineffective police force that had been reduced to shambles by the previous Congress-led regime, whose home minister Ravi Naik and kin now face charges of being involved in the drug trade.

    The incident has triggered an avalanche of reactions.

    “The police department is scared of Nigerians. I am ashamed to say this,” said Michael Lobo, a legislator of the ruling BJP.

    Independent legislator Rohan Khaunte, whose constituency of Porvorim was host to the high-voltage drama, said that the public came to the rescue of the police instead of it being the other way around.

    “The situation was mishandled. Action should be taken against the SP North. Locals in fact helped the police and not the other way around,” he said.

  • Amaechi protests as police block Govt House road

    Amaechi protests as police block Govt House road

    The frosty relationship between the police and the government of Rivers State degenerated yesterday, with some officers blocking a major road that leads to the Government House.

    Governor Rotimi Amaechi and a group of former Speakers were returning to the Government House after a tour of projects when they found the road barricaded with police vans.

    The policemen claimed to be acting on the instruction of Commissioner of Police Mbu Joseph Mbu, who has been at loggerheads with Amaechi.

    The convoy of about seven vehicles, including two buses in which the governor and the former speakers rode, was stuck for close to 25 minutes, The Nation learnt.

    Several efforts were made to persuade the police to allow the vehicles pass through. They refused to.

    One of the policemen got angry, saying he would not be challenged by civilians, it was learnt.

    Three police vans were parked across the road and all residents of the Old GRA street could not drive in or out of the area.

    The governor, who was dressed in a white shirt and a pair of white trousers and shoes, walked up to the spot where the three vans were parked across the road. He said: “You can see for yourself that we cannot go to the Government House through this road on the instruction of the President and the Commissioner of Police.”

    Eventually, the convoy took another route to get into the Government House.

    Earlier yesterday, Amaechi had received President Goodluck Jonathan at the International Airport and planned to meet with him later in the day.

    The President was visiting nearby Bayelsa State.

    There were 102 former Speakers in the convoy. Among them was former Lagos Speaker Olorunnibe Mamora, who was shocked by the police action.

    Mamora said: “It is quite unfortunate; it is an act of impunity and overzealousness on the part of the police.”

    The barricaded road leads to Braithwaite Memorial Specialist Hospital, which doubles as the General Hospital.

    The police denied blocking the Government House’s entrance.

    Spokesperson Angela Agabe, a DSP, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Port Harcourt: “I am aware that the commissioner of police did not give such an order to block the entrance leading to the governor’s residence.

    “He did not do it and did not instruct our officers to do such a thing.’’

    But, Mrs Ibim Semenitari, the Commissioner for Information and Communication, insisted that Amaechi and no fewer than 70 visitors were denied access to his private residence in the Government House.

    “The governor was coming back with his visitors, former speakers of Houses of Assembly; he was blocked on his way into the Government House, leading to his private entrance.

    “The police blocked the road, the governor came down and identified himself, but they told him they had orders from the commissioner of police.

    “Governor Amaechi, therefore, had to go through a longer route to get to the Government House,’’ Semenitari said.

    Semenitari described the action of the police as illegal, unconstitutional, and an insult to the office of the governor.

  • Protests continue in Kwara over Offa rerun

    Protests continue in Kwara over Offa rerun

    •Ahmed swears in PDP candidate

    The protests over the nocturnal declaration of the result of last Saturday’s rerun in Offa Local Government Area of Kwara State entered the second day yesterday.

    The Chairman of the state Independent Electoral Commission (KWSIEC), Dr Uthman Ajidagba, announced the result on the state radio in Ilorin, the state capital, on Sunday morning.

    The announcement has triggered a chain of reactions across the country and the state in particular.

    Members, supporters and sympathisers of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state yesterday took to the street for a peaceful rally in Ilorin.

    They called for the reversal of the early morning declaration of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate as the winner of the August 31 rerun.

    Also in Offa, the headquarters of Offa Local Government, over 5,000 protesters poured onto major streets and roads to show their grievances.

    The young and the old as well men and women took part in the Offa rally.

    The grouse of the protesters, led by the former Caretaker Committee Chairman of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Comrade Sola Iji, was the alleged fraudulent declaration of the PDP candidate, Prince Abdulwaheed Olanipekun, as the winner of the election, instead of the APC candidate, Prince Saheed Popoola, who polled the highest votes – as was evident in the collated results from the wards.

    The protesters grounded human and vehicular movements in several parts of Ilorin. They called the state government and KWSIEC unprintable names.

    The routes covered by the protestors, who took off from the Offa Road office of the defunct Congress Party of Nigeria (CPC), include the Post Office, Emir’s Road, Oja Oba, Gegele, Ita Amodu, Ibrahim Taiwo Road, Unity Road and Murtala Mohammed Road.

    Despite these protests, Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed yesterday swore in Olanipekun as the chairman of Offa Local Government.

    Iji described the governor’s action as fraudulent and illegal.

    He said: “We went through the town and returned to where we started. By tomorrow, we will continue until justice is done.

    “That’s a fraudulent swearing-in. As far as we are concerned, they (the PDP) have not won any election. The true result should be given to us. At the rightness of time, we will get our mandate.”

    Speaking with The Nation on phone, an APC member in the House of Assembly from the local government, Olayonu Tope, said the government” “action “is political robbery. It means we don’t have respect for the rule of law.

    “How can somebody who polled about 4,000 votes against the one that scored over 11,000 now become the winner? “That means we are not mature for democracy.”

    After the swearing-in, Ahmed said: “It is a thing of joy that the exercise, which recorded a massive turnout of voters, was adjudged free, fair and credible.

    “Clearly, your victory at the election signals the people’s confidence in your capacity to deliver good governance, given the recent events in Offa Local Government.

    “I, therefore, urge you to take urgent steps to implement people-friendly programmes to restore the people’s faith in democratic governance.”

     

  • Group protests against President

    The United Nigeria Group has called for the impeachment of President Goodluck Jonathan for breaching his oath of office.

    Addressing reporters at the Airport Hotel, Ikeja, the chairman of the group, Comrade Isa Tijani, said the action of the President was capable of truncating democracy. He said the group would lead a protest march to the National Assembly.

    He said that the offences committed by the President include the abuse of power, endangering democracy, reneging from the oath of office to protect and uphold the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and complicity to truncate the rule of law and other atrocities.

    The group explained that the protest had to be postponed because of the fasting period. “Our Muslims compatriots complained about fasting and combining it with demonstration that may require a lengthy trekking will not augur well.

    “The National Assembly will commence a recess on, which makes it difficult for them to do anything on it, until they return. Should we embark on it, we may risk sweeping such a burning issue under the carpet.

    “The various stakeholders have expressed concern with lack of contact in time and as such asked for little more time to ensure wider contact and consultations,” he said.