Allegations false, exaggerated – Danbatta
BY BENEDICT NWACHUKWU, ABUJA
The Executive Director of the Adopt a Goal for Development Initiative and co- convener Centre for Liberty, Ariyo Dare Atoye, has declared that the Nigerian democracy is heavily threatened in a manner that has never been seen before under the President Muhammad Buhari-led administration.
Ariyo, a Civil Society Organization activist said what the current APC government was doing was a coordinated onslaught in a way to gag free speech.
However, APC National Publicity Secretary, Salisu Danbatta, would have none of Ariyo’s opinion. He said the comments were false, exaggerated and unfair to the President. He argued that the National Assembly should be held responsible for whatever flaws that come from there.
The APC spokesman said, “It’s very unfair for anybody to leave the Senate President and his colleagues at the National Assembly and begin to blame the President. What has the President got to do with passing of bills? People should be fair to the President.
“If anybody feels aggrieved with what happened, they should go to the National Assembly and register their grievances.”
Danbatta claimed that some of the CSOs were not registered and that some individuals hid under them to make unguarded utterances they could not substantiate.
He insisted that “my single line response is that all the allegations are wrong, false and exaggerated.”
Ariyo had accused the APC government of doctoring existing Bills in the National Assembly in a manner that they could insert clauses and provisions that could be relied upon to gag free speech since they failed in their bid to introduce a single legislation for that purpose.
“I can tell you that our democracy is heavily threatened in a manner that has never been before under the President Buhari administration. They tried by all means to gag the free speech of the citizens using a single legislation which failed.
“Having failed to use the single legislation to gag free speech and undermine the rights of Nigerians to free hearing, what they have now done is to resort to doctoring existing Bills in the National Assembly in a manner that they are able to insert clauses and provisions that they can rely on to gag free speech,” he said.
The Civil Rights activist warned that the activities of the APC government were tilting to the creation of a closed society that would be teleguided with an autocratic rule, adding that “when that is done, there is no longer democracy in action.”
Ariyo insisted that it was a very bad and challenging period for democracy in Nigeria, noting, “We do not have the government that believes in democracy. We are living with a government that believes in control and command of the civil sector and they believe that they should determine what people should say or what people should not say and how people should reason.”
The executive director argued that democracy was also about the protection of lives and properties but maintained that it was not so in Nigeria.
“Of course, democracy entails all about protection of people’s lives and security and all of that. Today, many Nigerians are killed every month. It means that democracy has suffered. Democracy is government of the people, by the people and for the people,” he said.
He lamented that elections in Nigeria had not produced good leaders because the elections had not been credible and stressed that it would take credible elections to produce democratic leaders and not autocratic rulers.
