The Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Dikko Abubakar, has been upbraided by a democracy inclined Non-Governmental Organization, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria for the biased intervention of the police in the factional infighting tearing apart the Rivers State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party.
HURIWA said the police was biased by arresting some local chapter leaders of the party and unilaterally transferring them to the nation’s capital to face trial in a Chief magistrate court in Abuja.
The organisation said the Abuja court lacks territorial jurisdiction over alleged politically-motivated trumped up charges and their subsequent detention at the Kuje medium security Prison in Abuja for several days after their arrest.
HURIWA also faulted the ‘harsh’ bail conditions granted the duo by the trial Chief Magistrate Court, which ordered that they be only released when two sureties signed their bail bonds and that one of the sureties be a resident in Abuja, one of whom must be a level 12 civil servant with a landed property in Wuse Zone 6 Abuja where the court is located.
The magistrate court also slammed N1 million bail to each of the accused persons.
The Rights group said some of the conditions may be unattainable given that the duo are said to be loyal to the River State Governor, Hon. Rotimi Amaechi, who is said to be having political differences with President Goodluck Jonathan.
HURIWA said Jonathan is regarded as the defacto ‘Governor’ of the Federal Capital Territory.
The rights group said it may be impossible for a top level civil servant in Abuja to risk his career by accepting to take any of the political prisoners into bail.
HURIWA said since bail was within the discretion of the presiding magistrate, the defendants would have been granted bail on liberal grounds given the political scenario that characterized their arrest and prosecution by the Nigerian Police Force.
The statement by HURIWA was made after a team of top officials of the organization embarked on an advocacy visit to the Kuje Prison at the weekend.
The rights group in a media statement by the National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and the National Media Director, Zainab Yusuf, named the political prisoners of conscience as Charles Amaefule, the PDP local chapter chairman in Omuma Local Government Area of Rivers State (allegedly loyal to Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi) and the party’s state factional assistant Secretary, Godwin Leo (also said to be loyal to Amaechi, who is at loggerhead with President Goodluck Jonathan over sundry issues linked to the rumored second term ambition of the current President and the uncertain but rumored Vice Presidency ambition of the Rivers State governor).
Besides, the rights group faulted the decision of the nation’s police hierarchy to round up only suspected members of the PDP faction loyal to the Rivers State Governor in the House of Assembly for their ignominious role in the fracas that broke out in the Rivers State House of Assembly, which led to its take over by the National Assembly when it was clear to every discerning member of the public that there were two groups of persons involved in the alleged breach of peace.
HURIWA warned the nation’s police hierarchy that the partisan role that it has played so far in the ongoing political crisis in the oil rich Rivers State has adversely affected the public image of the Nigerian Police Force as an institution that is used to serve the whims and caprices of the powers-that-be in the nation’s capital.
HURIWA to IGP: You are biased in Rivers’ political crisis
