The leader of Effective Leadership and Empowered Voices for Transformation and Equity, (iELEVATE), Comrade Nedd Gideon, said he almost got killed by overzealous security agents in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, during the nationwide peaceful protest tagged #EndBadGovernance.
Speaking to newsmen, Gideon said following the pervasive hardship in the country occasioned by the harsh economic policies of President Bola Tinubu’s government, he came out like other well meaning Nigerians to protest peacefully at the government- designated venue, MKO Abiola National Stadium,alongside other protesters.
He said: “We were about to make a procession towards Central Area when men suspected to be officers of the Department of State Services (DSS) and police barricaded the protesters ahead and began to fire teargas canisters at us.
“These men started firing light ammunition at us, and we all scampered for safety. These officers were on a mission to kill us.
“We made our way back to the National Stadium and these men, with ulterior motive, followed us and continued firing at us.”
He added that while the protesters were trying to move close to the iconic City Gate, which is located close to the National Stadium, the security agents re-started attacking them (peaceful protesters) with teargas canisters.
“I was shot at not from not more than 20 feet away and broke my head. The only thing I had in my hand was the Nigerian flag. I had to use it to tie my head that was seriously oozing out blood.
“Even while we knelt down on our knees begging the police officers to spare our lives, they remained adamant,” he stated.
Gideon noted that the “venom” with which the police and other security agents deployed to attack innocent protesters in Abuja, if left unchecked, will lead to a plethora of dead bodies of innocent protesters whose only ‘offence’, he noted, is that they acted in accordance with the 1999 Constitutional provisions on peaceful protests.
The rights activist called on President Tinubu, the Inspector General of Police, the Director General (DG), DSS, and other security chiefs to call their men to order.
He said if peaceful protest has become a crime in Nigeria, then it should be scrapped from the Constitution rather than the current situation where armed security agents allegedly routinely violate and abuse the rights of citizens.
