LAST week, as the world commemorated the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, the Federal Government handed down a warning to security agencies against the inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees in their custody. The warning was issued by the Solicitor-General of the Federation and Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Justice, Mrs Beatrice Jedy-Agba, at an event organised by the National Committee Against Torture (NCAT) to mark the day. Jedy-Agba called on stakeholders to speak with one voice against the perpetrators of torture and for all victims in order to build a better, more humane society for all people everywhere. She said: “We wish to seize this opportunity to encourage our diligent law enforcement agencies to continue to take measures in combating torture in all their detention centres. I admonish you to continue to give the NCAT necessary support whenever it reaches out as every action taken by the committee is with a view to rooting out torture and ensuring that Nigeria complies with its international obligations. We are indeed partners in this journey and the NCAT will take deliberate and proactive steps to sensitise, engage and train our officers on prevention of torture.”
Perhaps for the first time in the life of the new administration, this is actually great news. In the past few weeks, the signs that Nigerians had been seeing in the polity had made them quite apprehensive. It is not for nothing that the civil society has started questioning and resisting the policies of the Federal Government, including the removal of subsidy, that have been implemented without putting in place any palliatives for the impoverished populace. With the mood in the country being extremely tense, Nigerians would be quite in order to see the government’s latest move as a positive signal, particularly given the country’s dark history with regard to the rights of detainees. They are apprised of the fact that this is not the first time the Federal Government has shown concern over the issue of inhuman treatment of detainees. Following the marking of the inaugural International Day in Support of Victims of Torture on June 26, 1998, the Federal Government, established the National Committee Against Torture as Nigeria’s national preventive mechanism in line with the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (OPCAT) in 2009.
The government also reconstituted the NCAT in September 2022, drawing its members from, among others, the Federal Ministry of Justice, Legal Aids Council, Nigerian Army, Nigeria Police Force, National Human Rights Commission, Nigeria Correctional Service, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Department of State Services and the Nigerian Bar Association. The committee’s mandate is to ensure that education and information regarding the prohibition against torture are fully included in the training of law enforcement and public officers; to prepare quarterly briefings to the AGF on cases of torture and propose appropriate administrative/judicial intervention and propose a review of anti-torture legislations, and to develop a national anti-torture policy. This has, however, not had the desired impact as the security agencies have continued to treat detainees as sub-human species.
We commend the Federal Government for thinking of and drawing attention to the plight of detainees. Nevertheless, we are watching out to see if it will walk the talk. When the Ibrahim Babangida administration came on board in the 80s, it also had populist moves. It opened the detection camps of the National Security Organisation (NSO) and freed detainees. Indeed, the then president famously declared that his government would not be draconian, and would welcome ideas from Nigerians, yet the administration turned out to be the very opposite of its initial image. The Bola Ahmed Tinubu government must avoid this eventuality even as we welcome the warning against flagrant violation of the constitutionally recognised and guaranteed rights of Nigerians. The move represents a commendable departure from the regrettable pastime of Nigerian governments in treating citizens and their rights with disdain. We believe that the new administration has come to the realisation that the past governments which rode roughshod on citizens thought that they were shoring up themselves but ended up diminishing themselves and making governance worse, casting ignoble aspersions on themselves and their memory.
This realisation means that the government must not fall for the cheap idea of playing games with the rights of citizens, as those rights are universally nurtured and embraced to make for better humanity and societal relations. Any society desirous of real progress and development has to build this on a healthy respect for citizens’ rights, which is what the Federal Government wants to imbibe through its current warning. We hope that it will not revert to the rule of force reminiscent of the terrible behaviour of past governments. The way to go is to harness the full contributions of Nigerians to governance and the process of development through steadfast and scrupulous respect of citizens and their rights. That way, the full benefits of such willing contributions will be harnessed.
We commend the government on this new disposition and hope that it will sincerely stick to it at all times.
READ ALSO FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
and then