DSS Arrests A Lone Protester At Nigeria's Presidential Gate

A human rights activist, Malcolm Omirhobo, who took his one man protest to the gate of the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Wednesday, has been arrested by operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS) report say.

According to statement by Nigerian lawyers, the Lagos-based lawyer undertook the one-man protest on Wednesday to register his displeasure at the killing of 46 farmers in Zabarmari community, Jere local government area of Borno State, by Boko Haram insurgents and the government’s unserious handling of insecurity challenges in the country.

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Omirhobo, was reported to have arrived the Villa Gate at about 9:00 a.m. clad in a customised T-Shirt with the theme ‘Stop The Genocide,’ in company of some journalists who were to cover the protest. There was a turn of events, DSS officers who, according to reports, stormed the scene in a Gestapo style arrested him despite showing them the permission he got from the police for the protest.

 

One of the journalists present at the scene said: ‘An argument ensued in the process as the lawyer insisted on seeing President Muhammadu Buhari in order to tell him to stop the carnage and the senseless killing of Nigerians in the country.

‘The police put a call to one of their superior officers who appealed and pacified Omirhobo to write a formal letter if he wanted to have an audience with the President, but he refused, and insisted that it was his right to see the President even without writing him officially.’

‘Trouble, however, started when armed DSS officials arrived at the scene and descended on the activist and harassed the journalists covering the scene.’

Omirhobo, who addressed journalists shortly before he was whisked away by DSS, said:

‘Coming on the heels of the slaughtering of 110 farmers in Borno State, I am here to tell the President that enough is enough. He should stop playing the ostrich because the government is backing all the evils perpetrated by these evil people killing innocent and harmless Nigerians.’

‘I am saying it categorically that the government is conniving, conspiring and assisting this crime against humanity, and that is why I am here to protest. I came here now, but the officers are saying that I cannot exercise my rights.’

 

AFRICA TODAY NEWS, NEW YORK