Sowore’s re-arrest: Atiku calls on Nigerians to speak up against tyranny

Former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar has urged Nigerians to speak the re-arrest of the convener of the #revolutionnow campaign, Omoyele Sowore barely 24 hours after releasing him.

Sowore was re-arrested on Friday, December 6, 2019, by operatives of the Department of the State Security Service (DSS) who attacked the publisher in courtroom while trying to arrest him.

While reacting to DSS’ re-arrest of the activist, Atiku in a series of tweet condemned the security operatives saying he was in extreme anguish to watch “the unfortunate drama that played itself out at the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja.”

Atiku said it has never happened in the history of Nigerian democracy for security operatives to “cause a commotion in court in order to frustrate a judgment of a court of competent authority”.

He tweeted: Today, I am in extreme anguish of spirit having watched the unfortunate drama that played itself out at the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, in which agents of the state caused a commotion in court in order to frustrate a judgment of a court of competent authority.

“Never in the history of Nigerian democracy has a judge been treated in such a disdainful and brazen attack on not just her person and office, but on the entire judiciary. This is unacceptable. It is a rape on the sanctity of the court.

“Nigeria is not a dictatorship. We are a democracy, no matter how inconvenient this fact is to the powers that have forced themselves on us.”

Atiku therefore, called for an immediate inquiry to be set up to identify the security officials “responsible for the maltreatment meted out to Justice Ijeoma Ojukwu and the desecration of her court”.

I further call for all law enforcement agencies in Nigeria to immediately respect not just the court order made by Justice Ojukwu, but the order of any court in Nigeria, on any detainee, be it Omoyele Sowore, Sambo Dasuki or Ibrahim Zakzaky, among others.

We cannot have a situation where our government is quick to obey foreign court orders and even quicker to disobey domestic court orders. This is symptomatic of a mindset that is servile to foreign powers and brutal to Nigerians.

Without the rule of law, there can be no rule at all. Power in Nigeria still flows from the people, not from the barrel of a gun. I call on all men and women of goodwill not to keep quiet or sit on the fence at times like this.

To keep Nigeria a democracy is the paramount duty of all concerned stakeholders. Please speak up against this tyranny and side with the Nigerian people.

Meanwhile, Sowore’s mother, Mrs Esther Kehinde Sowore has pleaded with President Muhammadu Buhari to release her son.