In a meeting held by some Lagos lawmakers, the Nigerian actor/ politician, Desmond Elliot, in his statement, expresses his heartfelt condolences to the families and the lives that have been lost as a result of the nefarious activities of SARS.
“I also want to commend our teen youths for their peaceful protests that have been going on now in various states of the federation. Indeed, the activities of SARS, even though the intendment of the unit being brought to life, was to maintain security have actually been taken the other way around. It has gone beyond just calling hotlines, gone beyond having the force. The national Assembly really needs to look into it. The IG of Police seriously must consider. We are working for the people. If the unit we have set up is not working for the people and the people are calling for it to be disbanded, then let us do what they are saying because the truth is you cannot just arrest people along the road because of the hair they wear or they are carrying laptops. That is not to say we don’t have bad people, but yes, because of the lack of training on how to deal civilly with people, we’ve now come to what SARS is today”.
Another speaker, quoting the fundamental human rights of the constitution, “Every person shall have right to life and no one shall be deprived intentionally of his life, Right to the dignity of the human person, Right of liberty and also fair hearing”
“What the Police are doing; we salute their courage of trying to help us in achieving one of these sections of the constitution that talks about the protection of lives and property but when youths are derailed to the extent where human dignity and right to life is threatened then there is a problem in the policy”, he said.
He further stated that ” the police are trying, we salute them. They can’t be removed easily, we don’t want them to be removed. SARS is doing wonderfully well, but we need to look into their acts and correct the anomalies that give them over-riding power to do and undo. Our citizens have died; extra-judicial killings. It is high time we find a means of trying as much as possible to make sure that Nigerian legislators, especially the National Assembly look critically into the laws and where necessary, amend because we have wasted away a lot of youths”.
Here are some of the petitions that were stated:
“The Commissioner of Police should protect the protesters and ensure that they are not molested. The Commissioner of Police in Lagos should stop unwarranted molestation of our youths by SARS with federal or state SARS. We call on the Governor of Lagos State, Babajide Sanwo-Olu to engage relevant institutions to protect the Lagos youths and stop the confiscation of phones, laptops, and other means of communication without a warrant. The Committee on Judiciary and Public Petition for the Lagos State House of Assembly to engage the Commissioner of Police and the Attorney General of the State with a foot to fashioning out ways to treat this petition”.
