Displaying items by tag: Security Agencies

Comrade Declan Ihekiare, human right activist and an independent observer of the EndSARS panel report is of the opinion that the bulk of the blame should go to the Federal government in charge of security agencies.

Ihekiare said this on Saturday on CityTalks with Reuben Abati, where he stated that apology should come from the Federal government.

The EndSARS panel, headed by a retired judge, Doris Okuwobi, had on Monday submitted its reports on the Lekki shooting and police brutality during the October 2020 EndSARS protests, to the state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu.

However, due to trust concerns, a member of the panel allegedly leaked the report to the public.

The Nigerian Army, Police, and other complicit persons were charged in the killings at the Lekki toll gate, according to the report.

The Panel report, has generated a lot of controversies, whereby the counsel for the State and for the victims were controverted.

In a reaction from the state government, “whoever leaked the report is not following due process.”

He expressed his displeasure on the attacks coming from both the lawyer from the state and that of the panel.

The human right activist stated categorically that the EndSARS report needs to be subjected to critical analysis.

However, he made a few mentions of discrepancies he observed in the report.

According to him, “I was not comfortable with the report where 4 protesters were presumed dead.

“I wanted a situation, where the panel will come up to confirm their demise.

“I saw a situation where the panel was saying that we are equating what happened that day to a massacre.

“In my view, a massacre is a massacre, you don’t need to equate anything.

“It is either there was a massacre there or not.”

He added, the report should be all sided, which implies that everybody that was affected in the struggle that led to the establishment of the panel should be included.”

In Ihekiare’s recommendations, both the federal government, Lagos state government and the military need to come up with their own white paper.