A MOST DISTURBING COURT SCENE

The rights of children must be protected

The sight of emaciated boys, including children, among the 76 individuals brought before the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court for allegedly participating in the August nationwide

 ‘EndHunger’ protests was disturbing. Many of the defendants were arrested from different northern states, including Kano, Plateau, Kaduna, Gombe and Katsina. They have spent more than three months in detention. During the court proceedings, many of them appeared ill and malnourished as they were called to take their pleas. In the process, four collapsed and had to be urgently escorted from the courtroom, prompting the judge to temporarily suspend proceedings. Trending online videos paint a pathetic picture of our criminal justice administration and how the weak and vulnerable are treated in Nigeria.

 In granting the defendants (who are facing charges of treason, among other offenses) a bail of N10 million each, Justice Obiora Egwuatu stipulated that each must secure two sureties in the same amount. One of the sureties must be a civil servant at grade level 15 or higher, with a verifiable address within the court’s jurisdiction, while the other must be a parent of the defendant. These are boys who have been left to fend for themselves and have basically grown up to be a social menace. So, the conditions set for their bail invariably means they are going back to indefinite detention under dehumanising conditions, despite the dubious claims by the Police.

A former Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) President, JB Daudu, SAN, has rightly denounced the detention and arraignment of the defendants as borne out of a “caricature of federalism.” The Attorney General of the Federation, according to Daudu, has no locus to charge the young men for offenses committed within their respective states. “We rightly ought to feel a collective sense

 of guilt and shame. I call on FGN to discontinue these charges and release all those charged for these state offenses, with adequate rehabilitative compensation paid to them,” Daudu stated. Meanwhile, it is not lost on Nigerians that a federal lawmaker who recently assaulted a Bolt driver and threatened to make him ‘disappear’ was handed only a N500,000  bail. 

At their meeting last week, northern political leaders and prominent traditional rulers reviewed issues that plague the region. In their communique, the leaders also reviewed the ‘End Hunger’ protest and the destruction wrought by young people. But there was no word on the issue of those arrested

and brought to Abuja for detention and trial. In a previous editorial, we expressed a strong condemnation on the protest which spun out of control. In the north, many of the children who were already out in the streets took advantage of the disorder to loot. But the Nasarawa State Governor, Abdullahi Sule, was apt when he declared that many of the protesters were Almajiris. It is therefore no surprise that most of the people being tried were collected from the streets of northern cities, even when they may not have participated in the protest. That perhaps explains why many could not even understand what was being said in court.

We do not condone criminality. But what a compassionate state, which we aspire to be, owe these children are education, food and decent treatment. Not indefinite incarceration. The state can even help them to reunite them with their parents or communities. While the education and welfare of these and other distressed children are the responsibility of their parents and respective state governments, it is the overriding obligation of the federal government to protect the rights of all Nigerian children. To allow the instruments of federal law enforcement to be used in a manner that abuses rights of children is a constitutional breach and a blatant misuse of state power.