By Abiola Olawale
A civil society organisation under the aegis of the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has called out President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for allegedly running an opaque, secret government.
The organisation in a statement issued on Monday, July 8, 2024, knocked the Tinubu government for running an administration that allegedly lacks openness, transparency and accountability.
According to HURIWA, the several rumours being peddled against the administration are a direct consequence of running a government in secrecy.
HURIWA in a statement by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, said this while reacting to the recent face-off between the Federal government and the Daily Trust over the SAMOA agreement.
HURIWA said that the government should have itself to blame for any perceived misgivings on the so-called SAMOA agreement since it is running an administration “akin to a secret society instead of opening up its policies, programmes and initiatives and subjecting them to public scrutiny before implementation.”
It said that since democracy is a government of the people, for the people and by the people in addition to the fact that Section 13(2) (b) of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, states that the welfare and security of the people is the primary duty of government, there is the need to allow and encourage citizens to participate in governance.
According to HURIWA: “Sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria from where Government draws legitimacy to exercise authority”.
It would be recalled that the Federal Government had vowed to drag Daily Trust, a national newspaper with head office in Abuja, before the Newspapers Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN) over its publication on the SAMOA agreement as well as approach the court over a report which it described as “fake and mischievous”.
The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, who spoke in Abuja on Saturday, faulted the report by Daily Trust which claimed that the government signed an agreement with clauses requiring Nigeria to endorse the rights of Lesbians, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex (LGBTQI+) people.
It would be recalled that Daily Trust had reported that Nigeria signed a $150 billion Samoa Deal that included an LGBTQ clause.
According to the report, the government allegedly signed an agreement that contained clauses that compel underdeveloped and developing nations to support the agitations by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community for recognition, as a condition for receiving financial and other support from advanced societies.
