#REVOLUTIONNOW: Buhari’s govt planning to silence opposition – Human Rights Watch

The Human Right Watch on Wednesday said the arrest of the convener of RevolutionNow, Omoyele Sowore, signified that President Muhammadu Buhari led administration was planning to silence the oppositions and critics in the country.

In a statement made available to our correspondent on Wednesday, the rights group said Buhari’s government was “intolerant to its critics”.

The statement reads; “The Department of State Security arrested Omoyele Sowore, claiming that his call for nationwide protests on August 5, called Revolution Now, was an insurrection aimed at a forceful takeover of the government.

“If Omoyele Sowore has been arrested in an attempt to stop the protests he helped to organize, that would be a damning indication of the government’s increasing intolerance for critical voices”, Anietie Ewang, Nigeria researcher at Human Rights Watch said in the statement.

He added that “The mere use of the word revolution as a slogan is not enough to support a claim of violent insurgency and should not be treated as a crime.”

Sowore, the publisher of Sahara Reporters, declared August 5 the beginning of “Days of Rage” to protest, among other things, an alleged lack of a level playing field in the March elections.

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The security agency’s public relations officer, Peter Afunaya, said that Sowore was arrested “for threatening public safety, peaceful co-existence, and social harmony in the country” by calling for a revolution through the protests.

Meanwhile, it was gathered that Nigerian government had placed Amnesty International on a security watch on August 1 for allegedly reproducing a message by the organizers of the Revolution Now protests in a tweet.

Amnesty International released a statement restating its commitment to human rights in Nigeria despite “sponsored protests” and efforts to smear the organization.

In a tweet from the Nigerian Presidency’s Twitter account on August 4, the government criticized Amnesty International, claiming it was promoting tweets that called for the overthrow of the country’s constitution.

Despite Sowore’s arrest, his supporters carried on with the planned protests on August 5. The protest later led to the arrest of several protesters who were later tried in court.

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