By Bashir Bello

Amnesty International Nigeria said that it has not felt the impact of panels set up to investigate issues of human rights abuses in the country as most reports from such panels were swept under the carpet and not made public neither were they implemented.

This was as the group said this practice promotes impunity as the perpetrators of such human rights abuses were not brought to book to serve as deterrent to others.

The Chairman, Board of Trustees of Amnesty International Nigeria, Auwal Rafsanjani stated this during a human rights media parley organized for journalists in Kano over the weekend.

Rafsanjani cited instances with panels set up by the Federal and state governments, the army-led Special Board of Inquiry and the Presidential Investigative Panel and the Judicial Panels of Inquiry set up by 29 state governments and the FCT over the End SARS protests respectively, whose reports were not made public.

According to him, “Suffice it to note that the impact of the various human rights panels set up in the country is yet to be felt. For example, the reports of the army-led Special Board of Inquiry and the Presidential Investigative Panel set up in 2017 to review compliance by the armed forces with human rights are yet to be made public, despite Nigeria’s commitment to do so.

“The Judicial Panels of Inquiry set up by 29 state governments and the FCT, in line with the directive of the National Economic Council (NEC), in the wake of the #EndSARS protests in 2020, are yet to be implemented. Only Lagos state made its report public.

“The reports are not made public nor implemented to avoid such kinds of atrocities. You will find out that the people are not brought to book for the kind of abuses they have committed. Because of these, people continue to violate the rights of other people. So that is why we felt that it is important we ensure accountability for the way and manner government does things. Because If this continues this way, people will lose confidence that there will not be justice.

“If you look at it, a lot of killings and abuses are happening both at the community level and by security agencies but most of those panels, the outcome has not yielded any positive thing to stop the further abuse or killings of Nigerians.

“Most of the reports of panels set up by the federal and state governments were swept under the carpet without ensuring justice for the victims. And this has continued to promote impunity.

“To this end, we call on the media to follow up in ensuring that the reports of these panels are made public, and their recommendations implemented,” Rafsanjani said.

The Country Director of Amnesty International Nigeria, Isa Sanusi who expressed worry over the increasing cases of human rights abuses in the country, dropped a hint that plans were underway by the group to unveil a human rights agenda for the country as part of its efforts to make Nigeria become a human right friendly country.

“We continue to be gravely concerned by the deterioration of human rights in Nigeria, bringing us to a situation whereby gradually impunity is increasing. Police brutality is rising. Gender-based violence is increasing. We are witnessing an unprecedented attack on the civic space. An example is the recent attack on NLC president Mr Joe Ajaero by the police in connivance with the Imo state government. There was no accountability for killings in the southeast, northeast and northwest.

“On 29 November, we are launching a comprehensive human rights agenda for Nigeria. We have already shared copies of the agenda with the Nigerian government What we are saying is, if they don’t if they don’t have any plan for human rights, here can guide the government to protect human rights. We believe all persons should live with dignity and there should be accountability for every human rights violence. Might should not be a right.

“We want to disrupt the status quo and then transform it into a human rights-friendly Nigeria,” Sanusi said.

Earlier, a don with the Department of Mass Communication, Bayero University, Kano, BUK, Dr. Suleiman Mainasara Yaradua called on the journalists to amplify salients human rights issues in the society as it is their responsibility to unearth the issues for redress.