Thursday, June 6, 2013

WE Will go to Court If Their Rights Are Infringed – Ango Abdullahi


In a statement, released by their
spokesman, Prof Ango Abdullahi, the Elders
Forum warm the Federal Government on
the decision and added they will head to
court if rights of their people are infringe
by the decision.
The NEF spokesperson said that “we don’t
know the content of the proscription (Ban)
as regards the Boko Haram and Ansarul.
“Boko Haram, to my understanding, is not
an organization that has been in existence
under the Nigerian laws. You proscribe an
organisation when it is recognised or
registered with the Corporate Affairs
Commission as an organisation.
It was founded as an organisation offending
the laws of Nigeria. This is the basis one can
say that such organisation could be
proscribed.
“But, outside that, one begins to hope that
there will not be infringement on freedom
of association, freedom of speech, freedom
of propagating religious beliefs and many
rights that are enshrined in the Nigerian
constitution.”
Prof Abdullahi added that, “I hope that none
of these freedoms will be touched because
if they touch them there is a clear
infringement on the right of the citizens.
And the citizens will go to court to challenge
the violation of their rights.
“Our concern is that these organisations are
not in any law book, not in Corporate
Affairs. Government initially said they didn’t
know the group. So you only proscribed
what is in existence under the law.
“What I thought government should do is to
concentrate on what they are doing and to
see in what way these people can emerge
and engage in discussion and dialogue so
that these crises could come to an end.
“Our concern is that our rights as citizens
will not in any way be breached.
“Everybody was happy when the committee
on peace and dialogue was set up, and then
soon after there was a declaration of state
of emergency.
The people you said they should come and
talk with you, how will they come out when
there is a state of emergency? How do you
expect them to come out?
The proscription, again, is undermining the
work of the committee; the committee
cannot make progress after this
proscription.”

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