Comrade Ayodele Akele, executive director Labour,Health and Human Rights Development Centre, has demanded the release of SERAC officials detained by Lagos State Government.He also called for the immediate release of the vehicles impounded as well. . Reports yesterday said the Lagos State Government in Nigeria has “imprisoned two staff members of the Social and Economic Rights Action Center (SERAC) and impounded two vehicles, one belonging to SERAC and the second to its Executive Director, Felix Morka. The move comes just days after a visit from the World Bank, occasioned by an urgent complaint filed by SERAC, to investigate the Lagos State Government’s massive demolition and forced eviction of the Badia East community on February 23, 2013.”
Akele said in a statement sent to Newsdiaryonline.com “We condemn it in the strongest terms and demand for the immediate release of the detainees and the impounded vehicles with adequate compensation to assuage their feelings.This Mr. Babatunde Fashola’s government is too lawless and must be checked through mass action!”
“The so called traffic law of Lagos State,Nigeria is not only unjust,it is discriminatory, oppressive,barbaric, unconstitutional,unpopular,anti-people, tyrannical and modern day Slavery”,Akele said.
He recalled that “About thrice we have staged protests peacefully against this unjust law under the aegis of of Joint Action Front,JAF,and all occasions and as usual we were brutally repressed, brutalized,arrested and detained by the notorious law enforcement agents at the behest of tyrannical governor of Lagos State,Mr Raji Fashola..”
Akele urged international rights organizations to wade into the crisis of abuse of rights in Lagos. “At this juncture we are compelled to invite the Human Rights Watch,Amnesty International, members of International Communities,Office of United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights etc to come to our aid in our fight against tyrannical government of Raji Fashola for the abrogation of this obnoxious traffic law and to investigate the pervasive gross and systematic human rights abuse and violations by Lagos State Governor Raji Fashola in a manner reminiscent of the dreaded dark days of military dictatorship of Sani Abacha!”Akele said.
