Protest: Investigate Rights Violations, Alleged Foreign Interest – Afenifere Tells Tinubu

The Pan Yoruba Socio-Political Group, Afenifere, has urged the Federal government to probe killings, alleged foreign interests and calls for military intervention during the nationwide #EndBadGovernance protest in the country.

This was contained in a communique issued after its Expanded National Executive Committee Meeting and signed by its national leader, Chief Ayo Adebanjo and National Publicity Secretary, Prince Justice Faloye.

The group called on “The Federal Government should investigate deliberate violation of rights particularly the circumstances of the killing of those who died in the protests and bring to book those including security agents proven to be culpable in these regards.

“The Federal Government should not take kindly but investigate alleged involvement of foreign interests as threats to Nigeria’s sovereignty and the treasonable calls for military intervention in the political affairs of the nation, the proof of which should attract the full wrath of the law.

On threats to resident non indigenes, Afenifere said that “Governments at all levels should rise against the threats to any group in any part of the country, immediately investigate and decisively deal with those found culpable, because of its implications for the security, unity and corporate existence of Nigeria.

Afenifere emphasized the right of every Nigerian citizen to reside in any part of his choice.

The group noted that “Nigerians are massively resident in every state or geopolitical zone irrespective of their ethnic identities.

While commending President Bola Tinubu’s decision to address the nation, during the protest, regretted that he ” failed to rise to the occasion in statesmanship particularly the hypocritical warning of those fanning embers of ethnic disunity which is the stock-in-trade of some of his advisers and spokespersons and the failure to concretely address the existential issues raised by the protesters.

The group said that ”government and its agents responded with threats and intimidation of the organizers, made a caricature of revered traditional institutions, exploiting ethnic and religious divisions.

“Afenifere urges President Tinubu to see the nationwide protest, the diversity of its prosecution and outcome in different regions, as a clear verdict for the restructuring of the Nigerian Federation in tandem with the well considered foundational covenant of true federalism and in honest demonstration of statesmanship immediately set in motion irreversible machineries in this regards as the panacea for the unity, peaceful coexistence and development of a nation where no man, woman or tribe is oppressed.

The group saluted “those security agents who professionally ensured civil treatment of the demonstrators and protected them from attacks by apparently hired gangs.

It however condemned “in no unmistakable terms the alleged display of foreign flags and interests in Nigeria’s purely domestic conversation and the surreptitious calls for military intervention in the political affairs of the nation.

“Be it eloquently made clear that never again will the military be tolerated in the politics and governance of Nigeria.

It also decried “the statement credited to agents of the Federal Government that the refined petroleum products from the Dangote refinery is inferior to those imported from abroad which statement without suggesting remedy is treasonable particularly in the current Nigeria’s state of economic and political emergency as it is meant to serve personal and foreign interests.

”Since efforts to revamp government refineries are bedeviled with corruption, Government should consider the privatization of the refineries and as a deliberate policy encourage local refinery particularly in the Niger Delta and set up quality control mechanisms in that regard for optimum local refinery and citizens’ access to affordable refined petroleum products.

“Afenifere considers it cheaper, more transparent and result-oriented with collateral benefits of mass employment and reduction in massive reliance on foreign exchange for the NNPC to sell crude oil to Dangote and other local refineries in Naira and at subsidised rates than subsidising refined products from overseas with its associated corruption and capital flight.

On lowering and stabilizing foreign exchange rates, import duties and interest rates, the group said that “Since government supplies foreign exchange to the market, it should increase the amount supplied by all means possible to bring the price down, even if it entails debt rescheduling and moratoriums.

”Interest rates must also be reduced to spur economic growth since our inflation is cost and not demand driven.

Speaking on demand of lowering food prices, Afenifere said that this “should be met with increased food production, not importation.

“Our farmlands and farmers must be secured from attacks through restructuring and decentralization of policing.

“With safe and peaceful returns of farmers, it takes less than a year to grow all our staple foods, so we can end this hunger within a year.

Afenifere asked government to *tackle issues affecting our crude oil production and revenues by providing more security, metering our actual oil production and curbing corruption.

“In the long term, government must develop the heavy manufacturing sector that can provide mass employment, which could be done through an accelerated development of a railway complex that will spur growth in all sectors of the economy.

The group asked the President ” not only to accelerate the implementation of the Orosanye Report, but also curtail wasteful, profligate and self-serving expenditures of public officers.

Afenifere said that ”wasting our commonwealth on expensive cars, official jets, humongous allowances and renovations of official residences must stop.”