A Divisional Police Officer in Abuja, Olabisi Daves, has sought justice for her colleagues killed during the #EndSARS protests that rocked Nigeria in 2020.
During the nationwide demonstrations against police brutality and other forms of human rights violations, hoodlums infiltrated the protests, unleashing mayhem on police personnel.
Ms Daves who is the Divisional Police Officer in charge of Life Camp Police Station in the FCT, made the appeal on Monday during the launching of Police Station Visitor’s Week by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).
Conducting top staff of the NHRC and journalists around its detention facility, the DPO asked Abdulrhaman Yakubu, who led the visitation team, about what the commission was doing to bring justice to murdered cops whose loved ones are in immense distress.
“What is your commission doing about police officers who were beheaded and their bodies roasted by criminals during the #EndSARS protests?” Ms Daves asked.
Responding, Mr Yakubu, a representative of the NHRC Executive Secretary, Tony Ojukwu, said addressing rights violations remains the commission’s core mandate.
“The NHRC takes issues of rights violations seriously, and individuals fingered in the killings of police officers must be brought to justice,” Mr Yakubu assured.
Backstory
The then Inspector-General of Police, Muhammed Adamu, had in November 2020, lamented the extent of damage caused by hoodlums who attacked police officers and stations in the wake of the #EndSARS protests.
Mr Adamu made the observation when he visited the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, at the State House in Marina.
According to official records, six police officers were lynched in Lagos, 36 critically injured, while 46 police stations were torched.
The police visitors week, Mr Yakubu explained, is in furtherance of the commission’s mandate to carry out periodic audit of places of detention across the country.
He added that the exercise is geared towards ensuring that “practices in detention facilities conform with human rights standards.”
Giving insights on the project, which is part of a larger project on strengthening police reforms in Nigeria being funded by MacArthur Foundation, Mr Yakubu, who heads NHRC’s department of Civil and Political Rights, said six states alongside the FCT had been selected for the exercise.
He listed the states to include – Sokoto (North-west), Bauchi (North-east), Benue (North-central), Oyo (South-west), Imo (South-east) and Edo (South-south).
“In carrying out the assignment, these trained visitors are tasked to collect and document information regarding the police stations, suspects (detainees), condition of the detention facility, and welfare of the detaining authorities,” Mr Yakubu explained during his interactions with police personnel during the flag off exercise on Monday in Abuja.
During the inspection of the police station’s five cells, this reporter observed only two detainees who said they were brought into the facility on Sunday.
There was also a temporary legal practitioner at the station whose responsibility is to ensure compliance with human rights requirements as enshrined in the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (2015).
