GOVERNMENT NOT FAIR TO FLOOD VICTIMS – SAYS HURIWA

Worried that state government administrations have done nothing concrete to assuage the anger of thousands of victims of last year’s floods across the country regarding poor distribution of relief materials, a call has been made to the federal government and the affected states to be transparent, fair and accountable in their encounter with flood victims.

In a statement jointly endorsed by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Director of media Affairs Miss. Zainab Yusuf, HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS’ ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) decried the ugly situation whereby most flood victims across the federation are offered paltry N3,000 each as total relief package from the several Billions of Naira raised by both the Aliko Dangote-led flood victims rehabilitation presidential panel and the funds disbursed from the presidency by President Goodluck Jonathan last year.

HURIWA has therefore tasked the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] to probe the groundswell of allegations that the fund for the flood victims are being systematically stolen and/or mismanaged by state government officials.

Citing an example of Kogi State whereby the victims of floods last year lost over 500 houses worth billions of Naira in the nine local council worst affected by the natural disaster, HURIWA faulted the decision of the Kogi State government to disburse only N3,000 each to the 1,500 residents rendered homeless by the devastating floods.

Specifically, victims of the 2012 flood disaster in Kogi State reportedly rejected the government offer of N3,000 each as compensation just as some of the flood victims told the media that they were offered the said paltry sum recently by a team of government officials at the local government education authority (LGEA) Primary School at Gadumo, Lokoja in Kogi State.

Victims of flood disaster similarly in Taraba, Adamawa and Anambra States have voiced out their concern of abandonment by their respective state administrations.

HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS’ ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) has in the light of the emerging gross injustice, unfairness, inequity and shabby treatment of these flood victims, suggested that community -based, faith-based organizations and credible civil society organizations in the affected states be constituted into Independent monitoring groups to ensure the transparent disbursement of these huge public fund to the right victims of last year’s floods.

HURIWA also wants governments at all levels to bring to book all indicted officials who have siphoned these public fund released for the purposes of providing funding support and lifelines to the actual victims of the 2012 flood disaster across the country.     

The Rights group which advocated proactive measures to avoid the repeat of last year’s flood disaster, also called on Nigerians to embrace environmental sanitation as a daily obligation.

HURIWA said; “We are unhappy that state governments which got hundreds of millions of fund to ameliorate the predicaments of the flood victims are now allowing rogue officials to feed fat on these resources meant for the poor. This inhuman and unfair treatment of the victims of last year’s flood disaster must stop”.   

3/4/2013

Nigeria: Rights Group Faults Police for Parading Baby Over Robbery

The Human Rights Writers' Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has condemned the recent parading by the Ogun state police command of a two-month old baby, the mother and a teenager for alleged robbery committed by the father.

HURIWA in a statement by the national coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the national media affairs director Miss. Zainab Yusuf described the action as atrocious, primitive and a total breach of the fundamental human rights of a Nigerian child.

The group faulted the "primitive and unconstitutional practice of parading crime suspects before they are properly charged to the competent courts of law, citing section 36[5] which provides that crime suspects remain innocent in the eye of the law until proven guilty by the court of competent jurisdiction."

HURIWA also cited chapter four of the constitution containing the fundamental rights of every Nigerian citizen as providing for fair hearing to be given to any crime suspect arrested for any kind of offence.

The body wants the federal government to fish out the police officers responsible for "this dastardly act that is totally unconstitutional, illegal and criminal" and punish them to serve as deterrent for future breach of the rights of the Nigerian children.

The police in the Ogun state had reportedly paraded baby Oyinkansola Adeosun, his mother Mrs. Fausat and 15 year old teenager Tobi Adeosun over an alleged robbery committed by the baby's father-Ismail Adeosun who fled before the police arrived the house.

The Ogun state police commissioner Mr Ikemefuna Aduba said the mother of the baby and the teenager were arrested for allegedly keeping gun for her husband but the woman claimed that she was no longer married to the fleeing robbery suspect and that she consistently asked the man to take away the gun which one of the arrested brothers was in the process of removing before all of them were apprehended by the police operatives.

3/4/2013

+HURIWA NAMES ACHEBE GREATEST ICON OF HUMAN RIGHTS +WANTS FG TO DECLARE ACHEBE'S OGIDI'S HOME AS NATIONAL MONUMENT

Pleased with the enormous volume of creative works produced during the life time of the internationally respected novelist Professor Chinua Achebe which have advanced the promotion and protection of the human rights of Nigerians and other citizens of the World, HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS' ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA [HURIWA] has named the late World acclaimed writer Professor Chinua Achebe as the greatest human rights icon of all times and will consequently induct him in the national human rights hall of fame of the body.

In a statement jointly authorized by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Media Affairs Director Miss. Zainab Yusuf, HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS' ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA [HURIWA] has also called on the National Commission for Museum and Moment and the Federal Ministry of Culture and Tourism to secure the country home of the late literary legend in Ogidi, Anambra state and declare it as a national monument as a way of immortalizing the monumental body of intellectual and cultural achievements made by the late Professor Chinua Achebe just as the rights group said the declaration of the personal estate of the late legend would be another way of preserving the edifice for generations yet unborn to appreciate the gift of such an enormously talented Nigerian writer who put Nigeria on the World's positive intellectual stage.

The media focused Non-Governmental organization which plans to stage a national human rights lecture in Abuja in the coming months to honour the memory of the late literary legend, also urged the Federal Ministry of Education to implement the translation of Chinua Achebe's greatest work 'Things Fall Apart' into the major languages of Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba and distribute the books freely to all Nigerian secondary schools as one way of restoring the lost glory of Nigeria's national reading culture and to academically empower the youth to pass their ordinary level English and English literature subjects with ease.

HURIWA also condemned what it called the hypocritical shedding of crocodile tears over the passage of Professor Achebe by the country's political leadership which over the years perpetrated grand scale corruption and economic crimes which led to the car accident that physically incapacitated the late Professor Achebe thereby necessitating his self exile to the United States of America where he sought and received the best of healthcare that sustained him several years after the fatal car crash in the badly maintained federal road in Nigeria.

HURIWA stated thus; "While we mourn the passage of Nigeria's greatest intellectual and writer of international repute, we have decided to honour his memory by recognizing him officially as the greatest human rights icon and we will complete the process by inducting him into our national human rights hall of fame and host it on our website @www.huriwa.org forever as a way of reminding Nigerians that this great writer used his creative talents to produce works of literature and novels that tell the Nigerian and African authentic story and also vigorously campaigned for the fundamental human rights of all Nigerians to be respected, promoted and protected".

"We hereby urge the Federal Ministry of Culture and tourism and the National Commission for Museum and Monument to declare the Ogidi country home of Professor Chinua Achebe as a national heritage/monument whereby tourists from all parts of the World could be given access to appreciate the place whereby the international writer and novelist grew up from a very humble background", HURIWA stated.

3/4/2013