Four people who were among the youths protesting the NIS recruitment exercise that went awry few weeks ago,were arrested for attempting to dump nine coffins at the headquarters of the Ministry of Interior in Abuja on Wednesday(yesterday).
The security operatives, who were alerted in advance of the plan by some youths under the aegis of the Concerned Nigerian Unemployed Youths, also foiled attempts by angry youths to demonstrate at the ministry and the official residence of the Minister of Interior, Mr. Abba Moro, in Abuja.
It was learnt that the four leaders of the angry youths were picked up when they allegedly defied security instruction to leave the area.
The members of the group who gathered at the Area 1 Roundabout, were met with more than what they had bargained for. Eyewitnesses say the overzealous officers of the Corps had swooped down on them, confronted them and began asking them to leave. There was no permit issued from the police officials in respect to their protest.
The Leader of the group, Japhet Omojunwua, reportedly told the security agents that it was a peaceful protest, as the death of one of their colleagues still remains fresh in their memory. That explanation did not go down well with the law enforcement agents. Witnesses say one officer had slapped the leader of the group in the face several times, and then began kicking him to the ground. Within minutes, other security agents joined-in, numbering over twenty officers. It was a brutal attack.
After a thorough beating lasting over 15 minutes, Japhet Omojunwua was then pushed, and dragged to the security agents’ waiting Hilux Patrol Van, along other three members of the group. They were then all taken to an unknown location.
The Leader of the security squad who refused to identify himself, quickly removed his name tag shortly after the beating on Japhet Omojunwua. According to eyewitnesses the security squad leader then seized the iPads and cameras of some nearby journalists who were covering the protest.
A female security officer later identified as Rose Mary Inuwa, was the first to assault the protest group leader, according to eyewitnesses, before she was joined by others officers in the beating.
It was further learnt that the driver of a Pickup van, who was hired to drop the coffins at the ministry, escaped when the four leaders were arrested.
Meanwhile, an outrage followed the arrest of the protesters on Wednesday as many Nigerians said the clampdown on protesters amounted to a breach on constitutionally guaranteed freedom of peaceful protest.
A former Minister of Education, Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, while demanding the immediate release of the arrested persons, described their arrest as an attempt to gag the citizens from exercising their rights to peaceful protest.
“Learning to bear the pain of citizens’ protest is the hallmark of democratic maturity. Our government must learn this. You can’t gag citizens. I expect that officials of the Department of State Services have acute sense of how angry citizens are, about the immigration tragedy, and so will nip anything that fuels it more!” she wrote on her Twitter page.
Also, ex-minister of the Federal Capital Territory and Aviation, Nasir el-Rufai and Femi Fani-Kayode, also flayed the arrest of the protesters on Twitter.
“I call on the government to release Omojuwa. He is one of the most forthright voices in the land and he cannot be silenced,” Fani-Kayode said.
Omojuwa and three others arrested with him have however been released at the time of this report.
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