International appeal from the Youth Rights Campaign (YRC)
- Economy collapsing and anger mounting
- Government moves to intimidate and punish opposition
- Drop ‘Treason’ and ‘Terrorism’ charges against protest organisers
- Defend the right to protest and free the hundreds detained for protesting
- Fight to defend Nigerians from economic and social collapse
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Urgent action is needed to support those challenging the Nigerian government’s disastrous policies, defending democratic rights and demanding change to prevent the catastrophe the country faces.
The Government is now pressing serious charges, including ‘Treason’ and ‘Terrorism’, against organisers and activists in different major cities of the #EndBadGovernance protests at the beginning of August. At the same time the president of the Nigeria Labour Congress, the country’s largest trade union federation, after facing police questioning over “criminal conspiracy, terrorism financing, treasonable felony, subversion, and cybercrime” has been called in again to now face investigation into “criminal intimidation, malicious damage to property” etc.
On September 2, after the #EndBadGovernance defendants were charged in court, Amnesty International summed up the process as “another round of the government’s unrelenting efforts to punish protesters and demonize protests.
“Some of the charges to be filed against the protesters, ranging from treason, which carries the death penalty, to allegations of a ‘plan to destabilize Nigeria,’ show how far Nigerian authorities can go in manipulating the criminal justice system to silence critical voices. These are blatantly trumped-up charges that must be immediately withdrawn.”
“These attempts by President Bola Tinubu’s government to charge those who protested against widespread poverty and rampant corruption with treason is beyond absurd and baseless.
“We condemn these sham trials even before they begin and call for an end to these endless, bizarre attempts to deprive people of the right to peaceful protest. What is going to happen to these protesters — who took to the streets last month seeking good governance — is a disguised exercise solely aimed at punishing dissenters.”
The fact is that Nigeria is in deep economic, social and political crisis and its government is determined to suppress opposition and protests.
Already suffering from stagnant living standards, insurgencies in different parts of the country and deep-rooted corruption Nigeria was plunged into deeper crisis when, last year, the new president Tinubu launched an unprecedented neo-liberal programme that has undermined both living standards and the economy as a whole.
The naira, Nigeria’s currency, has collapsed in value from 460 naira to a US dollar when Tinubu was sworn in at the end of May last year to a dollar being worth over 1,600 naira now.
One result is that food prices have risen by 39.5% in the last year, resulting in 31.8m Nigerians suffering from acute food insecurity. Just now the Central Bank reported that for most Nigerians being able to buy food is their main priority, way above paying for transport and their children’s education.
The situation has been far worsened by last year’s sudden withdrawal of ‘fuel subsidy’, a measure which meant that transport, cooking and running electricity generators at work and home used to be, to a certain extent, affordable. This removal, coupled with the devaluation, has result in fuel prices rising by 460 per cent in 15 months since Tinubu took office.
There is mass unemployment and underemployment. The economy is stagnant. Millions survive on a day to day basis. The government’s figures now don’t show that as the official definition of being unemployed was recently changed to exclude anyone who has worked an one hour for pay in the previous seven days. One hour’s work in seven days is hardly employment.
Alongside the drop in living standards a significant number of foreign companies are ending production in Nigeria because of high input costs, extremely weak infrastructure and social breakdown. Now the country’s foreign debt repayments are up nearly 54% compared with last year.
In August the African region of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC – Africa) summed up the current situation – “Nigeria, now the capital of global poverty, surpassing India, is at a critical crossroads. The country’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) figures show that 133 million people live in multidimensional poverty. The crises of food and fuel inflation (a 28-year high of 34.19%) and grinding unemployment have been pushing millions into extreme hardship and misery”
In this situation naturally protests have developed as anger has mounted. Early August saw the first #EndBadGovernance protests organised by a broad front of different forces opposing the government’s neo-liberal policies and the corruption gripping most levels of government and parts of the state.
The possibility of widespread protest terrified the government which launched a campaign against #EndBadGovernance starting and, when its activities began, resorted to repression with increasing use of authoritarian measures.
The ITUC-Africa explained that when there have been signs of opposition there has been a “heavy-handed response by the government to legitimate and peaceful assembly and protests”. The British Trade Union Congress has spoken of the Nigerian government seeking “to crush the protests”.
The reason for this is that the regime feels weak and fears protest.
Last year President Tinubu was elected with just 8.8 million votes, less than 10% of Nigeria’s 93.5 million registered voters. This, in a country whose population is now over 230 million, is a weak mandate.
Tinubu is not only facing anger over the results of his policies but also the corruption which the ruling elite are infamous for. In total there are billions of dollars coming from oil and gas revenues which have disappeared over recent decades.
There is even secrecy over what members of the national assembly are actually paid. One Senator recently told the BBC that he received 21,000,000 naira, over $13,000, a month in salary and expenses. In May last year, before the recent devaluation, this would have been equal to over $45,000 a month, more than three times the current $14,500 monthly salary of a US Senator. In comparison the Nigerian minimum wage has just been increased to 70,000 naira, $43, a month.
Against this background the regime is lashing out, trying to intimidate opposition, making wild accusations as justifications for repressive measures like raiding Labour House, the Secretariat of the Nigeria Labour Congress, while the Nigerian Police PRO speaks of the discovery of plans to “mobilize the public to violently storm police facilities and military barracks, anticipating a bloodbath that will instigate international condemnation of the Nigerian government”.
The British TUC correctly said that the police actions against the NLC are an “intimidation of trade unions”. The reason is that fearful of the potential strength of the trade unions the Tinubu government is desperate to pile pressure on to try to avoid a repeat of 2012’s nationwide revolt, which included a general strike, that forced the then government to backdown from ending the ‘fuel subsidy’.
Repression is spreading in Nigeria. Journalists are being assaulted and sometimes detained for shortish periods in a clear attempt to influence what they report. But more significantly there has been widespread brutal suppression of #EndBadGovernance protests which left over 30 dead and well over a thousand protesters arrested, especially in the North, alongside the seizure of protest organisers in many parts of the country.
The case of Adaramoye Michael (Lenin), the National Coordinator of the Youth Rights Campaign (YRC), a member of the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM) and one of the key organisers of the #EndBadGovernance protests in Abuja, the federal capital, shows how this regime is operating. He was arrested at 2am on August 5 at home and held incommunicado in a secret venue with no legal or family visits. Then 17 days later, on August 22, he, along with 123 others, was remanded in detention for a further 60 days at a secret court hearing at which neither defendants or defence lawyers were present. To no surprise the court did the government’s bidding with no apparent enquiry as to the detainees’ wellbeing. News of this secret court decision only came out when the state news agency NAN reported it on August 24, a report which also revealed the charges Michael and his co-defendants were being investigated for, namely, “criminal conspiracy, terrorism financing, treasonable felony, cyberstalking and cyberbullying”. Only on August 29, over three weeks after he was seized, was Micheal able to see a lawyer and then on the following weekend was told he would be charged in court on September 2.
Already there have been international protests. After the security services raid on the NLC headquarters and the police summoning the NLC President for questioning the International Confederation of Trade Unions protested with its General Secretary saying “The situation in Nigeria is deeply concerning. These latest events come on the back of a sharp rise in intimidation and repression of trade unions”.
“This includes the harassment of activists, the violation of collective bargaining rights and the violent suppression of peaceful protests. We see the systematic contravention of ILO conventions by the Nigerian government, particularly those related to freedom of association and the right to organise.”
Many in Nigeria have condemned the arrests of #EndBadGovernance protesters and others caught in police roundups. Already in mid-August Amnesty International called the arraignment of 441 people in Kano “an unfair trial based on trumped up charges” and demanded the “immediate and unconditional release of all those arrested for exercising their right to peaceful assembly”.
The fact that the state seems, at least for now, to have limited themselves to just questioning Joe Ajaero may be linked to the NLC’s threat of a general strike if he was arrested. Clearly the state hopes they can intimidate the NLC leaders not to take serious action over the repression and the social crisis gripping Nigeria when, in fact, a mobilisation to defend democratic rights and for urgent steps to improve living standards is urgently needed.
The protests need to be stepped up. Support must be given to those fighting to defend living standards and democratic rights and against a massively corrupt elite to open the way for a new society.
Immediately it must be to demand the dropping of the serious, yet ridiculous, court charges against the #EndBadGovernance protest activists and the immediate release of those detained for organising or participating in protests against economic collapse.
At the same time, it is necessary to support those struggling to change Nigeria. It is not a question of foreign interference in Nigerian affairs but giving support to the mass of Nigerians achieving a better life. The workers’ movement and socialists do not have to apologise for that.
September 4, 2024
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