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Brutalization Of Anti-Toll Protesters In Lekki Barbaric And Irresponsible By Bamidele Aturu

December 17, 2011

I have just been informed of the horrifying use of unreasonable force today, the 17th of December, 2011, by police officers acting apparently under the instigation and direction of the Government of Lagos State to disperse Nigerians protesting the illegal and extortionate tolling of the main road leading to Lekki.

I have just been informed of the horrifying use of unreasonable force today, the 17th of December, 2011, by police officers acting apparently under the instigation and direction of the Government of Lagos State to disperse Nigerians protesting the illegal and extortionate tolling of the main road leading to Lekki.



 According to information at my disposal from sources close to the protesters not less than 21 persons have been clamped into detention by the police officers who brutalized and wounded several other protesters. From information available to us even journalists were not spared as their cameras were destroyed in the orgy of maniacal violence sponsored by the State government and those who promote the controversial commercialization of the peoples’ road.
 
The decision of Lagos State Government to unleash violence on the people it claims to govern is barbaric, condemnable and unacceptable. It has always been recognized that dissent and protests are keys indicators of the existence of liberal democracy in any polity.

There is no warrant for the atrocious repression of citizens exercising their freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. The desperate resort to violence is doomed to fail as the government has now succeeded in drawing many of us to the barricade on the Lekki brouhaha.
 
Lagos State Government needs to realize that the Lekki road, as well as others, in Lagos State belongs to the people and not to the government. The necessary implication of this is that if it is unable to convince the people as to the advantages of tolling the road, it must bow to the wishes of the people. Lagos state does not belong to the government
or to any political party or party baron.
 
 I call on the Commissioner of Police and the Government of Lagos State to release immediately all those detained for exercising their constitutional right to express themselves and associate. The government should also apologise to the protesters and their family forthwith. Decent Nigerians should condemn the resort to Gestapo tactics by the Government of Lagos State and prevail on the government to backtrack. The disposition of Lagos State Government has clearly demonstrated that our elite are the same. Pray what is the difference between the wrong headed insistence of the Jonathan Federal Administration to proceed with subsidy removal in spite of mass opposition and that of Lagos State Government to toll Lekki Road at all means and by all cost?! I can assure the government this is a war it can never win. A word is truly enough for the wise.
 
Bamidele Aturu
 

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