Lawyers and Activists slam police for Allegedly Acting in Bad Faith in the Babalola-Farotimi case

Lagos-based lawyer, Barrister Emeka Iheonu, criticized the police handling of Farotimi’s case, stating that the Ekiti policemen who arrested him after receiving a petition acted improperly.

Iheonu stated: “They should have formally invited him, shown him the petition, and asked him to write his state­ment.

“They should have gathered all the evidence against Mr. Farotimi before charging him to court. For the police to op­pose his bail application on the ground that the investigation was ongoing, was appalling. He is presumed innocent until prov­en guilty.”

Baba Aye, a veteran activist and Editor, Socialist Worker, also stressed that: “There is no way the arrest of Dele Farotimi and the unfold­ing cases against him can be justified. What we are seeing is wanton impunity and shameless repression.”

Baba Aye, Council Member, Progressive International (PI), also added: “The police did not only effectively kidnap him. They threatened to shoot staffers in the office and robbed them of their phones. And we say we are living in a sane society? No, this is unacceptable.

“We are witnessing a situa­tion where the high and mighty want to make it clear that they are beyond reproach.

“Colonial-era laws are being brought to bear with the full force of the bile of a degenerate ruling class with a police force of ‘mad dogs’.

“Working class people, rad­ical youths and activists must push back against this incipient neo-fascist order.” he said.

Comrade Hassan Taiwo Soweto, National Spokesperson, Youth Rights Campaign (YRC), also said, the conduct of the police so far has been disgraceful and shameful.

Soweto believes that defamation should be treated as a civil issue, not a criminal one. By pursuing it as a criminal case, the police and the Nigerian government are attempting to alter the fundamental principles of civil liberties in Nigeria.

“Don’t forget that just recent­ly, the Nigerian state successfully converted protest from the status of a civic action to a treasonable offence, the committal of which merits the death sentence.

“In this case also, what is up for redefinition is the concept of Freedom of Expression. By turning defamation into a crim­inal matter, Chief Afe Babalola (SAN), using the police and the Nigerian state, is trying to send a note of warning to everyone that while freedom of expression may be guaranteed in our con­stitution, freedom after speech is a different matter altogether.

“This is the main goal of Dele Farotimi’s ordeal and it is why everyone must rise up to say ‘enough is enough’. Nigerians’ right to freedom of expression is inalienable under the Consti­tution.

“Where anyone exceeds the limit of that right, our laws give ample opportunity for aggrieved parties to seek redress by under­taking civil legal actions.

“That is the position of the law at the moment and we all must resist this attempt to re-define the law in order to shield highly placed people and corrupt members of the ruling elite from public scrutiny. He reiterated

“Back to the police, I think the current IGP, Kayode Egbe­tokun, is bad news for democrat­ic rights. His action over the past few months shows him to be an enemy of the Nigerian people.

“This explains why all his conducts have been decisively aimed at eroding democratic rights and converting the police into paid thugs of state and non-state actors.

“This is a country where the police would take months before undertaking an investigation when ordinary citizens file complaints of crime at police stations.

“The way the police orches­trated the speedy arrest and ab­duction of Dele Farotimi from Lagos to Ekiti State is highly worrisome as it shows the police acting recklessly, not in the ser­vice of the Constitution, which they swore to defend, but in the service of private interest.

“And we all know the cor­rupt police do not do this kind of thing for free. I think the Commissioner of Police in Ek­iti State has a case to answer over the abduction of Dele Farotimi.

“He needs to tell the world how he raised funds he used to send policemen to Lagos to ‘abduct’ Farotimi. These are legit­imate questions and not some­thing meant to cast aspersions.

“What is the budget of the Ekiti State Police Command and how did they afford to fund the expeditionary force from Ekiti to abduct a Nigerian citizen in Lagos?

“We need a public probe pan­el to investigate how the arrest of Farotimi by men of the Ekiti Police Command in Lagos, was funded.

“However, after all said and done, we also must say that the police are only acting true to their calling as a tool of oppres­sion in a capitalist society.

“In this sense, the police are leopards which cannot change their spots.
To change the police for the better, requires replacing the oppressive and exploitative capitalist system with a socialist system under which oppression and exploitation will be a thing of the past and Nigeria’s wealth used to better the lots of all.”

Furthermore, The Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) issued a statement, signed by its president Debo Adeniran and Publicity Secretary Idris Afees Olayinka, noting that Farotimi had previously alerted the public to a police plot to arrest him..

The CDHR committee confirmed that Farotimi’s arrest claim was true, as police took him from his Lagos office to Ekiti state where he was charged with criminal defamation against chief Afe Babalola.

The CDHR stressed that the whisking away of the human rights lawyer to Ado Ekiti, in the first instance, was uncalled for because the alleged offence was not committed in Ekiti.

It maintained that the Lagos State Police Command could have been allowed to handle the case and ensure that the prose­cution of the activist was done in Lagos.