FG okays special courts for hate speech, kidnapping
Judicial and executive arms of the federal and state governments will establish special courts for the prosecution of hate speech purveyors, kidnappers and terrorists.
This is one of the resolutions of the Thursday’s retreat on National Security according to the communiqué made available to journalists yesterday by the Senior Special Assistant to the Acting President on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande.
Akande said the Federal Government would be helping states develop a template on how such special courts would be established and managed.
“NEC members urged prompt action in the arrest and prosecution of perpetrators of terrorist acts, kidnapping and purveyors of hate speeches. To facilitate this, the designation of special courts was also advocated and the consensus was that judicial and executive arms of the federal and state governments would be working together to establish such courts,” he said.
He said the retreat reviewed current security challenges across Nigeria including, terrorism in the northeast, herders/farmers clashes, ethnoreligious crises, regional agitations for secession, hate speech, kidnapping and security challenges in the Niger/ Delta.
He said the NEC recognized the herders/farmers conflict as a problem of land use, which had “however taken an ethnic and religious coloration” and agreed that both the Federal Government and states needed to properly define the problems and eschew the ethno-religious construction “of what is otherwise an economic challenge.”
He said the council observed that it would be useful to bring the different groups of herdsmen and the farmers together to meet and discuss as well as work out some of the issues affecting them.
The retreat also demanded that community policing model be immediately enforced ahead of the required constitutional amendment for state police.
It was agreed that policing the country and the entire law enforcement generally could not effectively continue without devolving policing and law enforcement out to the states.
Akande noted that Osinbajo directed the Inspector-General of Police to initiate community policing in line with the provisions of section 215(3) of the 1999 constitution as amended and section 10(1) of the Police Act.
“According to section 215(3) of the Constitution, “the President or such Minister of the Government of the Federation as he may authorise in that behalf may give to the InspectorGeneral of Police such lawful directions with respect to the maintenance and securing of public safety and public order as he may consider necessary and the Inspector-General of Police shall comply with those directions or cause them to be complied with.
“Also section 10 (1) of the Police Act, “the President may give to the Inspector-General such directions with respect to the maintaining and securing of public safety and public order as he may consider necessary, and the Inspector-General shall comply with those directions or cause them to be complied with.”
Akande also quoted the NEC as calling for greater accountability of the budget releases of the defence and other security agencies.
“While issues about the funding of security agencies and provision of equipment also featured in the discussion, NEC members agreed funding is indeed key. It was however added that defense budget and funding for other security agencies of government always forms some of the biggest component of the budget, and calls for greater accountability of the resources released were also made,” he stated.
He said the retreat stressed the need for a more effective coordination between the security and intelligence agencies to build a security community well synergized, without which optimal performance of different security and intelligence agencies might be difficult.