The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) has condemned “unequivocally” the “brazen” and “serial” breaches of the fundamental rights of Nigerians including in some cases the right to life by officers of the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad (FSARS), a specialist unit of the Nigerian Police and other security agencies.

This is contained in a statement in the social media handles of the NBA President, Mr. Olumide Akpata, sighted by TheNigeriaLawyer (TNL)

Akpata applauded the Inspector General of Police for banning SARS and urged him to ensure enforcement and monitoring of the new directive.

“The NBA welcomes with cautious optimism the latest statement from the IGP banning FSARS, STS and IRT from routine patrol on the streets, amongst other measures and promising to apply sanctions in cases of breach. We however note that there had been previous statements following similar agitations but without appreciable changes.

The @NigBarAssoc (NBA) condemns unequivocally the brazen & serial breaches of the fundamental rights of Nigerians, including the right to life, by officers of the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad (FSARS) a specialist unit of the @PoliceNG and other security agencies. pic.twitter.com/4PCAalJKOc

— Olumide Akpata (@OlumideAkpata) October 9, 2020

“It is therefore of utmost importance that this time around it should not be business as usual. The Police must put in place demonstrable measures to ensure proper enforcement and monitoring of the new directives.” the statement reads in part

According to Akpata, the purpose of government is the welfare and protection of the people that’s why the people surrendered some of their freedom to the State in exchange for the protection of their rights and maintenance of the social order.

He said, “It is thus regrettable that the organ of the Nigerian State, entrusted with the protection of the people, has constituted itself into a source of constant and predictable terror especially to young Nigerians, to the extent of matching or even surpassing the criminal elements from whom they were designed to protect the people.

“The actions of FSARS are both inconsistent with the social contract which the people have with the government and are also in flagrant disregard of the Police Establishment Act and all our laws including the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”

The NBA therefore called on President Buhari, the National Assembly and the IGP to strictly monitor and enforce the current directives regarding banning of FSARS, and put an end to the flagrant abuse and extrajudicial killings of Nigerians by these officers.

He added that his administration will be setting up dedicated helplines in the next few weeks to receive complaints about human right abuses by the Police and other security officers and pledged that the complaints will be adequately tackled.

He said, “In the meantime, we urge all # EndSARS protesters to remain constructive in their agitations while calling on the different formations of the Nigerian Police to respect the fundamental rights of Nigerians including the freedoms of association, peaceful assembly and expression.

“While the current administration of the NBA has rightly prioritised the welfare and interest of Nigerian lawyers, our role as the Bar necessarily extends to acting as a watchdog of the society and speaking out in instances of abuse of power and trampling of rights of other Nigerians as has been on the rise lately.

“I do not believe that the activities of the FSARS and other elements of the Nigerian Police represent the best intentions of the President and the IGP for the Nigerian Police and I will be taking this up further with them with a view to ending this menace.

“The NBA is willing to proactively engage with the IGP to undertake urgent training and enlightenment of Police Officers in accordance with the recently passed Police Establishment Act to ensure the effective implementation of the Act and more respect for the rights of citizens in a democratic State.

“The NBA is also willing to collaborate with Civil Rights Organisations and Advocacy Groups to deal with this menace and we shall deploy our human and material resources in this regard.”

Some elder statesmen and prominent activists says Nigeria is on autopilot.

John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Dr Hakeem Baba Ahmed, Gen. Martin Luther Agwai (rtd.), Prof. Attahiru Jega, Professor Jibrin Ibrahim, Dr. Nguyan Shaku Feese, Dr. Usman Bugaje, Adagbo Onoja, Amb. Fatima Balla, Ambassador Zango Abdu, Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, Chris Kwaja, Dr. Hussaini Abdu, Kemi Okenyodo, Jim Gala, Aisha Muhammed Oyebode and Tsema Yvonne said this in a joint statement on Thursday.

They spoke under the auspices of the Nigeria Working Group on Peacebuilding and Governance (NWGPG).

They called themselves a group of Nigerian civic and thought leaders.

According to them, the Nigerian State is on autopilot and is currently not being governed.

“The result is that corruption has gone completely out of control, as there is a concerted effort to dismantle anti-corruption agencies and render them ineffective, while evidence of corruption is growing, prosecution has slowed down considerably,” they said.

They said the time for citizens’ action was now, asking Nigerians not to agonize any more, but organise.

“The civil society actors noted that in the absence of a binding narrative, there are series of conspiracy theories that have emerged, with immense capacity to divide the country along the sharp lines of ethnicity and religion, which is further sustained by the absence of strategic communication between the Nigerian state and its citizens.

“This situation is further heightening the level of desperation among the citizens that are increasingly been detached from the everyday governance of the Nigerian State,” they said.

The group lamented that increasing insecurity across the country continues to gallop towards the abyss due to the lack of political will and the inability of the country’s security architecture to manage the multiple challenges.

They also warned that confidence towards the Nigerian State is very low, heightening the divides in the federation and creating widespread demands for dialogue and consensus building on restructuring which the government has been tone deaf to.

“Indeed, the presidency has adopted the strategy of responding to demands for urgent and holistic review of the basic structures and governance processes of our nation with demeaning statements.

“This tendency to abuse those who legitimately ask those with responsibility to listen to popular voices is alienating more Nigerians from the administration and playing into the hands of those who feed off desperation.

“The nation needs to adopt a sense of urgency in the way it deals with rapidly accumulating liabilities.

“Nigerians cannot wait for the convenience or pleasure of leaders in deciding what is important.

“We must avoid the tendency to ignore our problems until they become a lot worse in terms of the capacities of leaders to deal with them.

“We call on younger Nigerians in particular, to get involved in the search for a future without current levels of bitterness and dislocations,” they said.

They, therefore, recommended that Nigerians in their communities, associations, civil society groupings, women’s groups and youth groups should accelerate on-going discussions to deepen the emerging consensus of how to build a national platform to address Nigeria’s political structure and process.

They said the coalition building process was aimed at the convening of a Peoples’ National Conference.

The phone line of the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, was repeatedly busy when called last night.

He also did not replied a text message sent to him by our reporter.

The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, on Thursday, lambasted the Executive Secretary of the National Human Rights Commission of Nigeria, NHRC, Tony Ojukwu for allegedly going cap-in-hand to foreign operated businesses in Nigeria to beg for sponsorship.

HURIWA said the alleged move by Ojukwu was inappropriate and clearly violates the provisions of the enabling act setting up the rights commission as would be cited below.

In a statement by its National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko asked the management of NHRC to rescind its beggarly tendencies and properly discharge her mandates.

The rights group noted that the commission’s mandates did not envisage that the management could go to the ridiculous extent of becoming a corporate beggar to even companies set up by foreigners in Nigeria, which are amongst the largest abusers of the employment rights of Nigerians with many of them using Nigerian workers as modern day slaves.

According to HURIWA: “It beggars belief and is indeed an unprecedented act of betrayal and compromise that the public funded national rights commission that should act as an independent investigator of all human rights-related infractions including the pervasive human rights violations against Nigerians working in foreign owned and operated companies in Nigeria is seen openly or clandestinely in an unholy communion with these same entities that the commission ought to provide oversight functions.

“It is the height of ethical depravity and the greatest show of shame that the head of this government funded agency that became financially and operationally independent in 2010 with wide ranging amendments to its enabling Act costing the taxpayers’ hundreds of millions of Naira to be seen begging companies to fund a movie. So what will happen if these companies are accused by their staff members especially Nigerians of gross human rights violations given that in recent times there have been well documented empirical evidence of grave human rights abuses of Nigerians by owners of foreign administered businesses in Nigeria?

“There is no doubt that the commission is the only government institution statutorily mandated to promote, protect and enforce human rights in Nigeria, we cannot do it alone.

“Our determination to keep advancing the course of human rights has brought us here today to partner your esteemed organisation to support the commission in its quest to take the knowledge of human rights to the doorsteps of every household in Nigeria.”

HURIWA recalled that the NHRC (Amendment) Act, 2010 has conferred on the Commission additional independence and strengthened the Commission’s power with respect to promotion and protection of human rights, investigation of alleged violation of human rights and enforcement of decisions. The Amendment Act has also widened the scope of the Commission’s Mandate to include vetting of legislations at all levels to ensure their compliance with human rights norms.

The federal government yesterday banned commercial activities under the Marine Beach Bridge, as rehabilitation works are completed for the bridge to reopen to traffic.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported that the Minister of Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, while inspecting the bridge directed ministry officials to adopt measures against street trading that sparked up the fire that destroyed the bridge several years ago leading to its degeneration.

Fashola said construction works on the Apapa-bound lane under construction have been completed and the section would be opened to traffic “in a few days’’.

While inspecting ongoing construction on the Apapa-bound lane on the top of the bridge, the contractors on the project explained that work was ongoing beneath the bridge while vehicles plied the top.

The minister, who commended the level of technology being applied, warned against allowing illegal activities under the bridge.

“You have to ensure no trading or illegal activities take place here again, in the first place that was what caused the fire that damaged this bridge,’’ he directed his officials.

He appealed to residents and other stakeholders in Ijora and Apapa to desist from abuse of the bridge

The over 40-year-old Marine Beach Bridge was damaged by a fire incident and repair work was first awarded for it in 2012.

It went through another round of six months repairs in 2017, before the current ongoing rehabilitation that began in phases in 2020 with the entire repairs expected to be completed in March 2021.

Ade Adesomoju, Abuja

The Federal High Court in Abuja has declared that magistrate’s courts lacked the power to issue an order freezing bank accounts.

The court also ordered banks to desist from acting on “bankers order” served on them, particularly by the police, to freeze or place a post-no-debit order accounts on personal accounts.

Justice Inyang Ekwo made the declaration in a judgment in a suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1635/2019 on Tuesday.

The suit was instituted by five children of the late Chief E. A. Esiso against one of their siblings, Yoma Esiso, four banks which had frozen their bank accounts, the Inspector-General of Police and the Commissioner of Police in charge of the IGP Monitoring Unit.

The five siblings who were the plaintiffs who instituted the suit are Mrs Eunice Oddiri, Beauty Ogbodu, Chief Sunny Esiso, Edirin Esiso, and Mrs Emuobosa Consin.

They stated in their suit that in September 2019 one of the landed assets of their late father in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, was sold and the proceeds were shared among the deceased’s children, including Yoma.

Yoma was said to have petitioned the police after which his five siblings were arrested and detained.

The plaintiffs were later released on bail but realised that their accounts had been frozen by their various banks which claimed to have received letters authorising them to so do from the office of the Inspector General of Police and the Commissioner of the Police in charge of the IGP Monitoring Unit.

The banks said the letters from the IGP office were accompanied with a document called a Bankers Order from a magistrates’ court, ordering the freezing/post no debit on the accounts.

The plaintiffs on December 24, 2019 sued their banks – Zenith Bank Plc, Stanbic IBTC Bank, Guarantee Trust Bank and First Bank Place – along with the IGP, the IGP Monitoring Unit, and Yoma.

They contend among others in their suit that that the order to freeze/post-no-debit obtained from the magistrate’s court and placed on their accounts on the strength of a non-existent law was illegal null and void.

Only GTB filed processes in response to the suit, while the rest of the defendants did not.

But in his judgment, Justice Ekwo ruled that GTB failed to effectively controvert the case of the plaintiffs as he held that there was no existing Nigerian law or relevant foreign law empowering magistrates to make such an order for freezing of persons’ accounts.

He therefore declared that “the Bankers Order/Order freezing and/or enabling the post-no-debit” on the listed accounts of the plaintiffs “cannot be validly issued pursuant to a non-existent/repealed Bankers Order Act 1847 and any other irrelevant foreign law”.

The judge also ruled that “a Magistrate lacks the powers to make Bankers orders and/or order freezing or enabling a post no debit on bank accounts pursuant to non-existent/repealed section 7 of the Banker‘s Order Act 1847.”

The judge therefore ordered the four banks “to unfreeze the accounts of the plaintiffs and desist from further giving effect to the non-existent Bankers order served on the prompting of the 5th and 6th defendants (IGP and the IGP Monitoring Unit).” (punchng)

While his peers cut their first teeth in banking, Jim Ovia perfected the money attitude. He was the enthralling magnate, who teased open fortune’s peonies, and unwrapped the seal to the tight bales of bloom in banking’s competitive halls.

Money chants its ornate poetry in Ovia’s treasure chest perhaps because he took the money shot – Cha ching! – time and over again, with the stamina of a warrior, and the agility of the quintessential marksman. 

Now past the glory days of his hustle as a seasoned and foremost banker, Ovia continually looms large as a conqueror of banking and high commerce. Having established his dominance in the cutthroat world of business, where he enjoys repute as banking’s top royalty, the Zenith Bank chairman, is eager to extend the luxury of his conquests and acquisitions to his loved ones.

Just recently, he acquired three units of luxury apartments at 4, Bourdillon, an iconic residential complex in the heart of Ikoyi, Lagos.

The diminutive billionaire who does not shy from aiming high paid a total sum of $10.5m for the apartments, valued at $3.5m per unit. Ovia, it was gathered, gifted two of his sons one unit each while he may have converted the last one to a private guest house.

Located at 4, Bourdillon Road, Ikoyi, the apartment which provides an infinite luxurious experience to its residents, is a Twin Tower of 25 Floors with 41 Units of 3 and 4 Bedroom Flats and 5-Bedroom Duplex Flats and Duplex Penthouses with lush greenery, water-bodies, swimming pools, tennis court, gym and clubhouse with ample underground parking and breath-taking views.

Targeting Nigeria’s elites, the property offers penthouses that include roof gardens and each has a curved balcony, which creates an attractive curvilinear appearance and is large enough to be used as an external relaxing area. Its glazed balustrade allows uninterrupted 360-degree views of Lagos Island. A joint development between Kaizen Properties (a member of TGI Group, which amongst others owns CHI Ltd – the leading FMCG Company in Nigeria with brands like CHIVITA and HOLLANDIA) and El-Alan Group, a foremost construction company with over 38 years experience working in Nigeria, 4 Bourdillon sets new heights and standards of luxury in Lagos where living becomes a daily bliss of peace of mind.

Ovia is an unabashed lover of properties and he is reputed to own most of the properties in which Zenith Bank operates from. The 68-year-old Forbes-rated billionaire is also known as the Godfather of Banking in Nigeria. (thecapital)

The Bayelsa State Government has described the proposed National Water Resources Bill 2020 as another draconian land use decree in disguise, saying it would join other progressive forces to resist it at all cost.

This was one of the decisions reached by the State Executive Council at its weekly meeting presided over by the State Deputy Governor, Senator Lawrence Ewhrudjakpo in Government House, Yenagoa, following the unavoidable absence of the governor.

A press release by the Deputy Governor’s Media aide, Mr Doubara Atasi, recalls that, the National Water Resources Bill 2020, which has passed its second reading on the floor of the Senate, has attracted wide condemnation across the country due to its controversial provisions aimed at seizing control of the country’s waterways.

In a joint Press Briefing led by the Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Hon. Ayibaina Duba, the Commissioner of Justice and Attorney General of the State, Mr. Biriyai Dambo (SAN), said Council decided to oppose the bill because it negates the rights of Bayelsans, Niger Deltans and several other people in the country to enjoy their God-given resources.

To this end, he expressed the state government’s readiness to apply all necessary legal frameworks to reject any legislation by the National Assembly that would emanate from the bill.

Mr. Dambo, while pointing out some relevant sections of the Bill, noted that Section 62 seeks to deny indigenes especially the Niger Delta people of their ancestral lands and the freedom of fishing for business.

His words “Section 62 of the Bill which states that any person who choose to undertake any of the activities in relation to water resources of this Bill, shall be licensed by the Commission”

“The essence of this is that, this Bill seeks to take away the freedom of not just the Niger Delta people but Nigerians at large, so if they start licensing the waterways activities, then you are encroaching on the freedom of the people and that is unacceptable”

“That is why Exco came to the conclusion that we reject this Bill and secondly, we shall also impress on members of the National Assembly from and outside this region to oppose this Bill with everything they have”

On his part, the State Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, Mr. Akpoebide Alamieyeseigha, said the recent Citizens Budget Participatory Session organized by the state government enabled Council to approve the Medium Term Expenditure Framework covering Year 2020 to 2023.

This, according to Mr. Alamieyeseigha, will set the tone for the presentation of the 2021 budget by Governor Douye Diri to the State House of Assembly in few weeks from now.